@RochdalePioneers lives in Scotland and has been involved in Scottish politics so I would trust his observatiins before a southern Englishman who has not lived there
On the one hand, Ireland is desperate for help with maritime security, and is going to Britain for that help, a country with a Navy that is so stretched that it had to rush a warship out of dry dock to defend its base on Cyprus, but Ireland's capabilities are so much less that help from Britain represents a lifeline.
On the other hand, Britain's economy is in such a woeful state in terms of generating investment and attracting investment that they are delighted with investment of under a billion euro from Irish companies into Britain, that will generate fewer than a thousand new jobs. No word on British companies having the spare capital to invest in Ireland.
The agreements are doubtless Good Things, but they are revealing of the major weaknesses of each country and the long-term failure of each country to deal with those weaknesses.
May be they should consider combining the two countries as it seems like a very synergistic fit?
Morning all Techne show Greens breaking through 15% for the first time away from YG/FoN and more Ref decline
Ref 27 (-3) Con 18 (-1) Grn 17 (+2) Lab 17 (=) LD 14 (=) SNP 3 (=)
That poll gives Reform 319 MPs, the LDs 82, Labour 63, the Greens 55, the Tories 50 and SNP 44.
So Farage probably PM with DUP and TUV support, he wouldn't even need the Tories (though tactical votes might reduce the Reform number of MPs elected) https://electionmaps.uk/nowcast/custom
@RochdalePioneers lives in Scotland and has been involved in Scottish politics so I would trust his observatiins before a southern Englishman who has not lived there
Polling is the same even on Mars
You sure about that?
Syria Planum North Ward – Martian Municipal Elections (Conducted under the Interplanetary Local Governance Act, 2087)
Electorate: 3,842 registered residents Turnout: 2,119 (55.1%) Rejected ballots: 17 (14 marked “None of these, bring back the rovers”, 3 eaten by a small maintenance drone)
Syria Planum North Ward – Martian Municipal Elections
Electorate: 3,842
Turnout: 2,119 (55.1%)
Rejected ballots: 17
14 marked “None of these, bring back the rovers”
3 eaten by a small maintenance drone
Candidate
Party
Votes
Result
Dr. Valentina Crater
Progressive Terraforming Party
812
Elected
Reg “Dusty” Halvorsen
Independent (Keep Mars Red)
601
Lila-7 Autonomous Unit
Robot Residents Association
423
Trevor Biggs
Earth Heritage Conservatives
198
“Gary” (Actual Martian Rock)
Protest Candidate
68
Majority: 211 over Reg “Dusty” Halvorsen
Swing: +7.4% toward the Progressive Terraforming Party since the 2083 by-election.
Which is why I find it genuinely depressing that, since devolution, we’ve had so little to show for it in the things that actually matter: health outcomes, education outcomes, housing, infrastructure delivery, addiction and mental health, local services that work, and the general sense that the state can still build and run things competently. Plenty of blame to go around across administrations, but after almost 19 years in power the SNP own the results.
There is a debate to be had about why the first Labour devolved administration was not as successful as hoped on that front, but the problem with the SNP is they are determined to prove that devolution can't be successful, which makes it hard for them to run a successful devolved administration...
The SNP are a protest party, a single issue nationalist campaigning group who have found themselves in power for the last 19 years with no idea what to do with it.
Come on then, give me your Unionist manifesto to make a success of devolution then.
The problem for Unionist parties in Scotland with devolution is that it has entirely infantilised them (and as sub branches being junior was always part of their nature). They constantly piss and moan about the EssEnnPee without providing any kind of an alternative prospectus except ‘well, we wouldn’t do that’. In addition having their head offices running non-devolved government for Scotland in perpetuity keeps them as barely developed embryos floating in the warm, amniotic fluid of the Union.
So.. the economy is stalled.. Eds running round like a headless chicken saying he's going to stop oil companies profiting from higher prices.. without the faintest idea how to do so. Starmer's in deep deep shit over Mandelson where an apology won't cut it , the Defence sec is useless despite being suggested as an alternative to Starmer. Its all going so well...
Weak weak weak.
Reports that in the 100,000 documents to be released, including whats app messages, some senior labour mps will be embarrasingly compromised
Morning all Techne show Greens breaking through 15% for the first time away from YG/FoN and more Ref decline
Ref 27 (-3) Con 18 (-1) Grn 17 (+2) Lab 17 (=) LD 14 (=) SNP 3 (=)
That poll gives Reform 319 MPs, the LDs 82, Labour 63, the Greens 55, the Tories 50 and SNP 44.
So Farage probably PM with DUP and TUV support, he wouldn't even need the Tories (though tactical votes might reduce the Reform number of MPs elected) https://electionmaps.uk/nowcast/custom
Who cares - it's 3 years away
This is pb.com! This is where people who care about this sort of thing come. You might as well be asking who cares about skyscrapers planned in three years on skyscrapercity.com.
@RochdalePioneers lives in Scotland and has been involved in Scottish politics so I would trust his observatiins before a southern Englishman who has not lived there
Polling is the same even on Mars
You sure about that?
Insert ‘plucking polling numbers from Uranus when it suits’ line here.
OIl prices off their overnight highs with Saudi apparently putting 2 million barrels (a drop) into supply via the Red Sea.
WTI is currently at $95 with Brent around $100 per barrel. These are the kind of numbers which, if sustained, will push us (and a lot of other countries) into recession. Even strong performing economies will feel this kind of oil price "shock" if it continues for any length of time.
There still seems plenty of confusion over Hormuz and oil production in the Gulf States and a degree of clarity would be welcome. The Iranians, if the morning coverage is to be believed, are still capable of strikes but on a limited scale.
Last night's local council by-elections were again poor for both Labour and the Conservatives with both losing share - to be fair, the seven votes won by Labour in the Cotswolds were fractionally worse than the eight won by the Conservatives in Liverpool but both parties took a pounding in all the seats.
Something for Reform, Greens and the LDs in last night's results and you could predict where the changes would be based on areas of known strength and weakness.
I'm beginning to wonder how well the Greens will do in parts of Inner London in May - it will be fascinating to see the numbers of candidates they can put up in places like Lewisham. Last time, Labour won 55% and all 54 seats, the Greens got 20% and stood 44 candidates. I suspect a full slate of Green candidates this time and if they can get the big swings some of the local by-elections are suggesting, it could be a real shock for Labour.
Is there a single place where you can look up last night's results each week? I comb PB and sometimes give up...
OIl prices off their overnight highs with Saudi apparently putting 2 million barrels (a drop) into supply via the Red Sea.
WTI is currently at $95 with Brent around $100 per barrel. These are the kind of numbers which, if sustained, will push us (and a lot of other countries) into recession. Even strong performing economies will feel this kind of oil price "shock" if it continues for any length of time.
There still seems plenty of confusion over Hormuz and oil production in the Gulf States and a degree of clarity would be welcome. The Iranians, if the morning coverage is to be believed, are still capable of strikes but on a limited scale.
Last night's local council by-elections were again poor for both Labour and the Conservatives with both losing share - to be fair, the seven votes won by Labour in the Cotswolds were fractionally worse than the eight won by the Conservatives in Liverpool but both parties took a pounding in all the seats.
Something for Reform, Greens and the LDs in last night's results and you could predict where the changes would be based on areas of known strength and weakness.
I'm beginning to wonder how well the Greens will do in parts of Inner London in May - it will be fascinating to see the numbers of candidates they can put up in places like Lewisham. Last time, Labour won 55% and all 54 seats, the Greens got 20% and stood 44 candidates. I suspect a full slate of Green candidates this time and if they can get the big swings some of the local by-elections are suggesting, it could be a real shock for Labour.
Is there a single place where you can look up last night's results each week? I comb PB and sometimes give up...
This evening's Trump whine. He isn't getting enough credit for being in office when it hits 250 years of independence.
Acyn @Acyn · 53m Trump: We have the Olympics, the World Cup, and twenty—you know, the 250. I did all three all of them. I got the Olympics, the World Cup, and then I got 250 but I’ve never been given credit for it. They won’t give me credit for 250 years but I’m here for 250.
To be fair they had the big 200 year celebrations in 1976 not 1983. No idea why but it was the big anniversary date in the US.
They uses the Declaration of Independence - 1776 - as the start date. In 1783 the Brits were just recognising the facts on the ground
Did Ireland become independent in 1916 or 1921?
I think the British date it from 1922 (Irish Free State) or 1931 (end of Dominionship) or even 1937 (Ireland)
The Irish sidestepped deciding on a single date by celebrating the centenary of the whole period, and significant events therein, 1916-1923 (to the end of the civil war).
Morning all Techne show Greens breaking through 15% for the first time away from YG/FoN and more Ref decline
Ref 27 (-3) Con 18 (-1) Grn 17 (+2) Lab 17 (=) LD 14 (=) SNP 3 (=)
That poll gives Reform 319 MPs, the LDs 82, Labour 63, the Greens 55, the Tories 50 and SNP 44.
So Farage probably PM with DUP and TUV support, he wouldn't even need the Tories (though tactical votes might reduce the Reform number of MPs elected) https://electionmaps.uk/nowcast/custom
Who cares - it's 3 years away
This is pb.com! This is where people who care about this sort of thing come. You might as well be asking who cares about skyscrapers planned in three years on skyscrapercity.com.
This is where people care about council by-elections. Which are a thing barely cared about by the people who actually live in the wards.
Hegseth previously fired those who gave their assessment last year of the original “ mission accomplished “ regarding Irans nuclear capability.
They were fired for not reporting what the Dear Leader wanted to hear .
Also Politico reported Tuesday.
According to them, the staff of the Pentagon department responsible for developing, analyzing, and implementing methods for protecting civilians in military operations, which previously had about 200 employees, has been reduced by 90 percent. And only one out of ten employees remains in a similar department of the US Central Command (CENTCOM).
These units were supposed to investigate the circumstances of the recent attack on a girls' school in Iran.
According to Politico, the aforesaid staff cuts made to these units have significantly reduced the US ability to protect civilians during the largest airstrike in decades.
America is led by morons.
The mission won't be semi-accomplished until ground troops take the uranium, at the very least.
The mission won't be fully accomplished until there is regime change, which will also probably need ground troops.
That's not a reason to end the conflict, it is a reason to go much harder and do it properly. Which they're too frit to do. Incompetents.
It's not that America is too afraid, it's that a ground invasion is essentially impossible. If they were to do it, they'd have to do it properly - invading the country and occupying it so the regime would not reconstitute itself or the nuclear program. That involves invasion and occupation.
Firstly, America just doesn't have enough soldiers. The liberation of Iraq in 2003 needed 200,000, so America might need half a million for this. The American frontline army is only 452,000, on active duty and it would need at least twice as many for its other simultaneous tasks, R&R, etc. so it would have to introduce conscription. And training the new, unwilling recruits would take a year.
Secondly, how do you get the troops there? A ground invasion of a country of 92 million people - four times the population of Iraq in 2003 - with still-loyal armed forces would need hundreds of thousands of troops. America doesn't have the landing craft for an amphibious assault on that scale, which would be 5-10x the size of D-Day. Manufacturing them would take a decade as America's shipbuilding capacity has atrophied since the end of the Cold War.
So it would have to be a ground invasion. Where from? None of Iran's neighbours are remotely likely to host US, let alone Israeli, ground troops on the scale necessary for the year or so it would take to get ready, all the while being exposed to Iranian attacks. Israel would be delighted to host American troops for an invasion of Iran, but it's too far away.
Thirdly, invading a country of 92 million is one thing. Occupying it is something else entirely. As I've mentioned on here before, a rule of thumb is that you need one soldier for every 20 people to hold down an unwilling country. That's 4.6 million to occupy Iran for who knows how long? Again, where are they to come from?
Fourthly, America is still a flawed democracy, albeit a flawed one, Wars need political support, especially if conscription will be necessary, and there's not much for an air campaign. For a ground invasion and occupation there would be none whatsoever.
In my upcoming trans article (with discussant contributions from kyf_100 and Cyclefree, currently being pre-read by Taz and Andy_JS), one of the appendices contains the discussion from PB we had about the difference between "should" and "must". In that discussion we see the following text...
I’m not asking for miracles. I’m asking for grown-up government: competent delivery, honest trade-offs, and outcomes you can measure. If you’re going to wrap yourself in Scottish pride and talk about our resource abundance, then show me the national project that turns that into shared prosperity. Otherwise it’s just branding. And I’m completely out of patience for branding.
Take the Scottish references out of that and you could easily be referring to the UK political scene as a whole. No wonder Reform and Greens are getting a hearing.
Ever since the financial crash things in the UK have, on many measures, stagnated or fallen behind. The leading political parties all have some responsibility for that.
In many respects that is what drove Brexit - and a fat load of good that has done for those that voted for it (excluding the retirees on final salary and triple locked state pensions).
Starmer promised that “grown up” government - and I do feel there is genuine intent - but his execution has been dreadful (and he often ends up simply reversing course). In many respects he is as much a prisoner of his own party and an irrational media as he is from his own shortcomings.
He doesn't seem to know how to navigate policies through the political system. Saying the Blob is stopping everything is an admission of failure.
All complex socio-political structures have multiple vested interests. Navigating policies through them is exactly what politicians are for.
Starmer came late to politics. 'Innocent abroad' is the best description, I think.
My thinking was that Starmer individually would bring, albeit selectively, a certain gamekeeper turned poacher approach to the blob, an ability to know how systems and structures work and use it, where he so desired to edge the blob towards change. After all, he had done that with the mechanics of the Labour party itself.
So, on things like the Chagos islands and perhaps with the treasury, he'd work with civil service orthodoxy and that is the way it has panned out.
But with things like criminal justice, immigration, housing and infrastructure, I imagined he'd have an idea of the types of institutional buttons to press to get things unblocked. Now, I'm not saying that my hopes have been wholly dashed on this score, and I wasn't necessarily expecting super zippy progress, but there have been more false starts and a bit less progress than I'd have thought back in 2024.
@RochdalePioneers lives in Scotland and has been involved in Scottish politics so I would trust his observatiins before a southern Englishman who has not lived there
Polling is the same even on Mars
You sure about that?
Syria Planum North Ward – Martian Municipal Elections (Conducted under the Interplanetary Local Governance Act, 2087)
Electorate: 3,842 registered residents Turnout: 2,119 (55.1%) Rejected ballots: 17 (14 marked “None of these, bring back the rovers”, 3 eaten by a small maintenance drone)
Syria Planum North Ward – Martian Municipal Elections
Electorate: 3,842
Turnout: 2,119 (55.1%)
Rejected ballots: 17
14 marked “None of these, bring back the rovers”
3 eaten by a small maintenance drone
Candidate
Party
Votes
Result
Dr. Valentina Crater
Progressive Terraforming Party
812
Elected
Reg “Dusty” Halvorsen
Independent (Keep Mars Red)
601
Lila-7 Autonomous Unit
Robot Residents Association
423
Trevor Biggs
Earth Heritage Conservatives
198
“Gary” (Actual Martian Rock)
Protest Candidate
68
Majority: 211 over Reg “Dusty” Halvorsen
Swing: +7.4% toward the Progressive Terraforming Party since the 2083 by-election.
Hegseth previously fired those who gave their assessment last year of the original “ mission accomplished “ regarding Irans nuclear capability.
They were fired for not reporting what the Dear Leader wanted to hear .
Also Politico reported Tuesday.
According to them, the staff of the Pentagon department responsible for developing, analyzing, and implementing methods for protecting civilians in military operations, which previously had about 200 employees, has been reduced by 90 percent. And only one out of ten employees remains in a similar department of the US Central Command (CENTCOM).
These units were supposed to investigate the circumstances of the recent attack on a girls' school in Iran.
According to Politico, the aforesaid staff cuts made to these units have significantly reduced the US ability to protect civilians during the largest airstrike in decades.
America is led by morons.
The mission won't be semi-accomplished until ground troops take the uranium, at the very least.
The mission won't be fully accomplished until there is regime change, which will also probably need ground troops.
That's not a reason to end the conflict, it is a reason to go much harder and do it properly. Which they're too frit to do. Incompetents.
It's not that America is too afraid, it's that a ground invasion is essentially impossible. If they were to do it, they'd have to do it properly - invading the country and occupying it so the regime would not reconstitute itself or the nuclear program. That involves invasion and occupation.
Firstly, America just doesn't have enough soldiers. The liberation of Iraq in 2003 needed 200,000, so America might need half a million for this. The American frontline army is only 452,000, on active duty and it would need at least twice as many for its other simultaneous tasks, R&R, etc. so it would have to introduce conscription. And training the new, unwilling recruits would take a year.
Secondly, how do you get the troops there? A ground invasion of a country of 92 million people - four times the population of Iraq in 2003 - with still-loyal armed forces would need hundreds of thousands of troops. America doesn't have the landing craft for an amphibious assault on that scale, which would be 5-10x the size of D-Day. Manufacturing them would take a decade as America's shipbuilding capacity has atrophied since the end of the Cold War.
So it would have to be a ground invasion. Where from? None of Iran's neighbours are remotely likely to host US, let alone Israeli, ground troops on the scale necessary for the year or so it would take to get ready, all the while being exposed to Iranian attacks. Israel would be delighted to host American troops for an invasion of Iran, but it's too far away.
Thirdly, invading a country of 92 million is one thing. Occupying it is something else entirely. As I've mentioned on here before, a rule of thumb is that you need one soldier for every 20 people to hold down an unwilling country. That's 4.6 million to occupy Iran for who knows how long? Again, where are they to come from?
Fourthly, America is still a flawed democracy, albeit a flawed one, Wars need political support, especially if conscription will be necessary, and there's not much for an air campaign. For a ground invasion and occupation there would be none whatsoever.
So.. the economy is stalled.. Eds running round like a headless chicken saying he's going to stop oil companies profiting from higher prices.. without the faintest idea how to do so. Starmer's in deep deep shit over Mandelson where an apology won't cut it , the Defence sec is useless despite being suggested as an alternative to Starmer. Its all going so well...
Weak weak weak.
Reports that in the 100,000 documents to be released, including whats app messages, some senior labour mps will be embarrasingly compromised
I’m not asking for miracles. I’m asking for grown-up government: competent delivery, honest trade-offs, and outcomes you can measure. If you’re going to wrap yourself in Scottish pride and talk about our resource abundance, then show me the national project that turns that into shared prosperity. Otherwise it’s just branding. And I’m completely out of patience for branding.
Take the Scottish references out of that and you could easily be referring to the UK political scene as a whole. No wonder Reform and Greens are getting a hearing.
Ever since the financial crash things in the UK have, on many measures, stagnated or fallen behind. The leading political parties all have some responsibility for that.
In many respects that is what drove Brexit - and a fat load of good that has done for those that voted for it (excluding the retirees on final salary and triple locked state pensions).
Starmer promised that “grown up” government - and I do feel there is genuine intent - but his execution has been dreadful (and he often ends up simply reversing course). In many respects he is as much a prisoner of his own party and an irrational media as he is from his own shortcomings.
He doesn't seem to know how to navigate policies through the political system. Saying the Blob is stopping everything is an admission of failure.
All complex socio-political structures have multiple vested interests. Navigating policies through them is exactly what politicians are for.
Starmer came late to politics. 'Innocent abroad' is the best description, I think.
My thinking was that Starmer individually would bring, albeit selectively, a certain gamekeeper turned poacher approach to the blob, an ability to know how systems and structures work and use it, where he so desired to edge the blob towards change. After all, he had done that with the mechanics of the Labour party itself.
So, on things like the Chagos islands and perhaps with the treasury, he'd work with civil service orthodoxy and that is the way it has panned out.
But with things like criminal justice, immigration, housing and infrastructure, I imagined he'd have an idea of the types of institutional buttons to press to get things unblocked. Now, I'm not saying that my hopes have been wholly dashed on this score, and I wasn't necessarily expecting super zippy progress, but there have been more false starts and a bit less progress than I'd have thought back in 2024.
On Chagos and elsewhere, he simply agreed with the systemic policy. That's easy to do in such an environment.
Changing the systemic policy is what politics is really for. And in the list "criminal justice, immigration, housing and infrastructure@ no one thinks that the systemic policy is 100% AOK.
Which is why I find it genuinely depressing that, since devolution, we’ve had so little to show for it in the things that actually matter: health outcomes, education outcomes, housing, infrastructure delivery, addiction and mental health, local services that work, and the general sense that the state can still build and run things competently. Plenty of blame to go around across administrations, but after almost 19 years in power the SNP own the results.
There is a debate to be had about why the first Labour devolved administration was not as successful as hoped on that front, but the problem with the SNP is they are determined to prove that devolution can't be successful, which makes it hard for them to run a successful devolved administration...
The SNP are a protest party, a single issue nationalist campaigning group who have found themselves in power for the last 19 years with no idea what to do with it.
Come on then, give me your Unionist manifesto to make a success of devolution then.
The problem for Unionist parties in Scotland with devolution is that it has entirely infantilised them (and as sub branches being junior was always part of their nature). They constantly piss and moan about the EssEnnPee without providing any kind of an alternative prospectus except ‘well, we wouldn’t do that’. In addition having their head offices running non-devolved government for Scotland in perpetuity keeps them as barely developed embryos floating in the warm, amniotic fluid of the Union.
In my upcoming trans article (with discussant contributions from kyf_100 and Cyclefree, currently being pre-read by Taz and Andy_JS), another of the appendices (appendix 6) contains a list of comments prior to the article being written. In that discussion we see the following text...
Morning all Techne show Greens breaking through 15% for the first time away from YG/FoN and more Ref decline
Ref 27 (-3) Con 18 (-1) Grn 17 (+2) Lab 17 (=) LD 14 (=) SNP 3 (=)
That poll gives Reform 319 MPs, the LDs 82, Labour 63, the Greens 55, the Tories 50 and SNP 44.
So Farage probably PM with DUP and TUV support, he wouldn't even need the Tories (though tactical votes might reduce the Reform number of MPs elected) https://electionmaps.uk/nowcast/custom
Given it is clear that Reform are also top of the anti tactical voting list it really doesn't show that. Probably closer to 200 Reform MPs than 300 off those numbers.
In my upcoming trans article (with discussant contributions from kyf_100 and Cyclefree, currently being pre-read by Taz and Andy_JS), one of the appendices contains the discussion from PB we had about the difference between "should" and "must". In that discussion we see the following text...
Have at it. And again, many thanks for putting in a huge amount of effort on parsing the law around this. I suspect you might get little in the way of thanks, and plenty of argument.
I’m not asking for miracles. I’m asking for grown-up government: competent delivery, honest trade-offs, and outcomes you can measure. If you’re going to wrap yourself in Scottish pride and talk about our resource abundance, then show me the national project that turns that into shared prosperity. Otherwise it’s just branding. And I’m completely out of patience for branding.
Take the Scottish references out of that and you could easily be referring to the UK political scene as a whole. No wonder Reform and Greens are getting a hearing.
Ever since the financial crash things in the UK have, on many measures, stagnated or fallen behind. The leading political parties all have some responsibility for that.
In many respects that is what drove Brexit - and a fat load of good that has done for those that voted for it (excluding the retirees on final salary and triple locked state pensions).
Starmer promised that “grown up” government - and I do feel there is genuine intent - but his execution has been dreadful (and he often ends up simply reversing course). In many respects he is as much a prisoner of his own party and an irrational media as he is from his own shortcomings.
He doesn't seem to know how to navigate policies through the political system. Saying the Blob is stopping everything is an admission of failure.
All complex socio-political structures have multiple vested interests. Navigating policies through them is exactly what politicians are for.
Starmer came late to politics. 'Innocent abroad' is the best description, I think.
My thinking was that Starmer individually would bring, albeit selectively, a certain gamekeeper turned poacher approach to the blob, an ability to know how systems and structures work and use it, where he so desired to edge the blob towards change. After all, he had done that with the mechanics of the Labour party itself.
So, on things like the Chagos islands and perhaps with the treasury, he'd work with civil service orthodoxy and that is the way it has panned out.
But with things like criminal justice, immigration, housing and infrastructure, I imagined he'd have an idea of the types of institutional buttons to press to get things unblocked. Now, I'm not saying that my hopes have been wholly dashed on this score, and I wasn't necessarily expecting super zippy progress, but there have been more false starts and a bit less progress than I'd have thought back in 2024.
On Chagos and elsewhere, he simply agreed with the systemic policy. That's easy to do in such an environment.
Changing the systemic policy is what politics is really for. And in the list "criminal justice, immigration, housing and infrastructure@ no one thinks that the systemic policy is 100% AOK.
I don't understand why anyone would get into politics to change nothing, apart from paying to give away a few atols in the Indian Ocean......
"The olive branch has been removed from the newly designed 2026 U.S. dime, which features an eagle clutching only arrows, along with the inscription "Liberty over Tyranny". This is a temporary, one-year change for the 250th anniversary of the U.S. and not a permanent, quiet removal; the standard Roosevelt dime design is scheduled to return in 2027 https://x.com/_BMSimpson/status/2032405753319796912
@RochdalePioneers lives in Scotland and has been involved in Scottish politics so I would trust his observatiins before a southern Englishman who has not lived there
Polling is the same even on Mars
You sure about that?
Syria Planum North Ward – Martian Municipal Elections (Conducted under the Interplanetary Local Governance Act, 2087)
Electorate: 3,842 registered residents Turnout: 2,119 (55.1%) Rejected ballots: 17 (14 marked “None of these, bring back the rovers”, 3 eaten by a small maintenance drone)
Syria Planum North Ward – Martian Municipal Elections
Electorate: 3,842
Turnout: 2,119 (55.1%)
Rejected ballots: 17
14 marked “None of these, bring back the rovers”
3 eaten by a small maintenance drone
Candidate
Party
Votes
Result
Dr. Valentina Crater
Progressive Terraforming Party
812
Elected
Reg “Dusty” Halvorsen
Independent (Keep Mars Red)
601
Lila-7 Autonomous Unit
Robot Residents Association
423
Trevor Biggs
Earth Heritage Conservatives
198
“Gary” (Actual Martian Rock)
Protest Candidate
68
Majority: 211 over Reg “Dusty” Halvorsen
Swing: +7.4% toward the Progressive Terraforming Party since the 2083 by-election.
In my upcoming trans article (with discussant contributions from kyf_100 and Cyclefree, currently being pre-read by Taz and Andy_JS), another of the appendices (appendix 6) contains a list of comments prior to the article being written. In that discussion we see the following text...
To me, this is terrifying. Kids are complex and knowing how to deal with things they say can be hard enough as a parent. The scope for harm is horrifying. And the fact that there are apparently parents dumb enough to buy/permit this shit even more so.
Thinking of how these models work, what on earth is it going to come out with for a child who thinks they're different, possibly autistic, questioning gender etc?
A friend, when we were over, had her and our kids using copilot as part of a game where they were hiding from her parnter. It suggested using sticks as weapons and various booby traps, home alone style
ETA: she did supervise them in their interactions and stopped after this!
In my upcoming trans article (with discussant contributions from kyf_100 and Cyclefree, currently being pre-read by Taz and Andy_JS), another of the appendices (appendix 6) contains a list of comments prior to the article being written. In that discussion we see the following text...
This will be the most boring article ever published in the history of the Internet but I've come up with a snappy title to leaven the doughy misery of reading the fucking thing - "The Transgina Monologues".
Which is why I find it genuinely depressing that, since devolution, we’ve had so little to show for it in the things that actually matter: health outcomes, education outcomes, housing, infrastructure delivery, addiction and mental health, local services that work, and the general sense that the state can still build and run things competently. Plenty of blame to go around across administrations, but after almost 19 years in power the SNP own the results.
There is a debate to be had about why the first Labour devolved administration was not as successful as hoped on that front, but the problem with the SNP is they are determined to prove that devolution can't be successful, which makes it hard for them to run a successful devolved administration...
The SNP are a protest party, a single issue nationalist campaigning group who have found themselves in power for the last 19 years with no idea what to do with it.
Come on then, give me your Unionist manifesto to make a success of devolution then.
The problem for Unionist parties in Scotland with devolution is that it has entirely infantilised them (and as sub branches being junior was always part of their nature). They constantly piss and moan about the EssEnnPee without providing any kind of an alternative prospectus except ‘well, we wouldn’t do that’. In addition having their head offices running non-devolved government for Scotland in perpetuity keeps them as barely developed embryos floating in the warm, amniotic fluid of the Union.
Sorry, went a bit Leon with the metaphors there.
did you read my post down-thread?
I did, a dearth of solid policy proposals but a lot of ‘just do things better’.
I recall one PBer (resident in England) saying that it was the SNP’s job to govern ‘superbly’ to make the case for an Indy Scotland. Since I can’t think of any recent national governments let alone devolved ones as a model for that level of attainment, it seems a bit unfair to single out the SNP for so much unrealistic expectation.
In my upcoming trans article (with discussant contributions from kyf_100 and Cyclefree, currently being pre-read by Taz and Andy_JS), another of the appendices (appendix 6) contains a list of comments prior to the article being written. In that discussion we see the following text...
This will be the most boring article ever published in the history of the Internet but I've come up with a snappy title to leaven the doughy misery of reading the fucking thing - "The Transgina Monologues".
Netanyahu: The war in Iran is turning Israel into a "global superpower."
So it’s not just Trump and Another Richard that are totally tonto.
Perhaps you would prefer it I would cheer along and wave the pompoms.
Okay then.
Joe Biden is fit for office. Hunter Biden is a victim of a political witch hunt. Even if Hunter Biden is guilty he will never be given a presidential pardon. The prosecutions of Trump are masterpieces of legal planning. Trump cannot win because his crowds are so small. Dems never gerrymander.
Alternatively I'll keep pointing out the occasional uncomfortable truth.
And you know why that's important ?
Because when groupthink become obligatory people stop thinking.
Merely repeating Trump’s lies sometimes mingled with half truths does not make them truths, uncomfortable or otherwise. And I might point out those were not what you have been saying above, so are essentially whataboutery.
And do you know why it’s important to call that out? Or am I justified in my comment on your mental state?
(The irony is one of the things you have written there is undoubtedly true!)
Stop your bleating and open your mind.
Saying that Joe Biden was unfit for office or that Hunter Biden was a criminal who received a presidential pardon or that the Dems gerrymander are not Trump's lies nor are they half truths.
They are verifiable facts which you are now denying.
You need to accept that we are not in a Manichean world but one of multiple shades where there are inconvenient facts and open minded analysis is required to better understand it.
Last evening I believe I comprehensively rebutted one of your pro- Trump, anti- Biden posts. A post you did not respond to.
The reason Biden needed to pardon Hunter Biden and pre-empt prosecutions against himself and people like Fauci was because Trump is so malign and vindictive. It is quite ironic really as one of my rebuttal points was that Merrick Garland and by definition the Biden administration did absolutely nothing to chase down Trump's Epstein criminality nor did they progress Trump's sedition charge at any reasonable pace.
Apologies I do not have the time and opportunity to respond to every post.
What we have with some people is an effortless shift in their narrative from "X will never be done" to "It is right that X has been done".
Examples being Hunter Biden's pardon or Dem gerrymandering.
What Trump causes in some people is a Manichean mentality.
Some people will declare that "Trump was right about everything" and even wear a hat to show their obsession, while others will shift into some "Trump was wrong about everything" mania which leads them to disagreeing with everything Trump has said or done and also claiming that his opponents were always doing the right thing.
So while Trump is a monstrous malignant narcissist who is corrupt, crude, abusive, erratic and totally unfit for office he has been correct about some issues.
Such issues including:
Europe needs to spend more on defence Energy security is important The benefits of economic growth have not been fairly shared in recent decades Uncontrolled immigration is leading to socioeconomic problems
And it is because Trump has highlighted such issues that he was elected twice.
Where it is justifiable to criticise Trump is his actions in response to those issues. These actions generally being badly planned and badly applied.
Likewise Trump being unfit for office doesn't change the fact that Joe Biden was also unfit for office.
The 'our side right, your side wrong' mentality of US politics has led to almost the entire political body of both parties proclaiming that a man who was unfit for office was fit for office. The only difference being that one half said that Biden was fit for office and the other half said that Trump was fit for office. When neither were.
That is the disgrace of the US political system and I do like to see it echoed on PB.
Which is why I find it genuinely depressing that, since devolution, we’ve had so little to show for it in the things that actually matter: health outcomes, education outcomes, housing, infrastructure delivery, addiction and mental health, local services that work, and the general sense that the state can still build and run things competently. Plenty of blame to go around across administrations, but after almost 19 years in power the SNP own the results.
There is a debate to be had about why the first Labour devolved administration was not as successful as hoped on that front, but the problem with the SNP is they are determined to prove that devolution can't be successful, which makes it hard for them to run a successful devolved administration...
The SNP are a protest party, a single issue nationalist campaigning group who have found themselves in power for the last 19 years with no idea what to do with it.
Come on then, give me your Unionist manifesto to make a success of devolution then.
The problem for Unionist parties in Scotland with devolution is that it has entirely infantilised them (and as sub branches being junior was always part of their nature). They constantly piss and moan about the EssEnnPee without providing any kind of an alternative prospectus except ‘well, we wouldn’t do that’. In addition having their head offices running non-devolved government for Scotland in perpetuity keeps them as barely developed embryos floating in the warm, amniotic fluid of the Union.
Sorry, went a bit Leon with the metaphors there.
did you read my post down-thread?
I did, a dearth of solid policy proposals but a lot of ‘just do things better’.
I recall one PBer (resident in England) saying that it was the SNP’s job to govern ‘superbly’ to make the case for an Indy Scotland. Since I can’t think of any recent national governments let alone devolved ones as a model for that level of attainment, it seems a bit unfair to single out the SNP for so much unrealistic expectation.
I don't think it's unfair in the slightest to lay the blame for the state of the nation I live in at the feet of those that have been in power for the best part of 20 years. I'm not in politics, so I don't have to provide you with anything like a solid policy proposal or unionist manifesto. I can point out everything and anything that the SNP does is wrong.
I reject your framing of politics in Scotland through the divisive and self-serving nationalist lens. I reject your tribal loyalty to any party over state and good governance.
but still, if you feel better about it you can just lump me in with the rest of the right wing unionist scum and ignore me.
More money pointlessly wasted subsidizing energy consumption rather than invested in energy efficiency of UK housing stock (insulation etc).
It’s simply silly, and I’m pretty disappointed the Lib Dems are going along with the lazy calls for the government to bail out consumers with money they don’t have.
Our electricity and heating prices are too high, but we’re heading into spring and we need market reform not giveaways. And pump prices are now some of the cheapest in Western Europe. Petrol is over €2 per litre in France now.
I’m not asking for miracles. I’m asking for grown-up government: competent delivery, honest trade-offs, and outcomes you can measure. If you’re going to wrap yourself in Scottish pride and talk about our resource abundance, then show me the national project that turns that into shared prosperity. Otherwise it’s just branding. And I’m completely out of patience for branding.
Take the Scottish references out of that and you could easily be referring to the UK political scene as a whole. No wonder Reform and Greens are getting a hearing.
Ever since the financial crash things in the UK have, on many measures, stagnated or fallen behind. The leading political parties all have some responsibility for that.
In many respects that is what drove Brexit - and a fat load of good that has done for those that voted for it (excluding the retirees on final salary and triple locked state pensions).
Starmer promised that “grown up” government - and I do feel there is genuine intent - but his execution has been dreadful (and he often ends up simply reversing course). In many respects he is as much a prisoner of his own party and an irrational media as he is from his own shortcomings.
He doesn't seem to know how to navigate policies through the political system. Saying the Blob is stopping everything is an admission of failure.
All complex socio-political structures have multiple vested interests. Navigating policies through them is exactly what politicians are for.
Starmer came late to politics. 'Innocent abroad' is the best description, I think.
My thinking was that Starmer individually would bring, albeit selectively, a certain gamekeeper turned poacher approach to the blob, an ability to know how systems and structures work and use it, where he so desired to edge the blob towards change. After all, he had done that with the mechanics of the Labour party itself.
So, on things like the Chagos islands and perhaps with the treasury, he'd work with civil service orthodoxy and that is the way it has panned out.
But with things like criminal justice, immigration, housing and infrastructure, I imagined he'd have an idea of the types of institutional buttons to press to get things unblocked. Now, I'm not saying that my hopes have been wholly dashed on this score, and I wasn't necessarily expecting super zippy progress, but there have been more false starts and a bit less progress than I'd have thought back in 2024.
On Chagos and elsewhere, he simply agreed with the systemic policy. That's easy to do in such an environment.
Changing the systemic policy is what politics is really for. And in the list "criminal justice, immigration, housing and infrastructure@ no one thinks that the systemic policy is 100% AOK.
I don't understand why anyone would get into politics to change nothing, apart from paying to give away a few atols in the Indian Ocean......
Starmer is a creature of the system of government. The DPP is a hierarchical organisation, obsessed with process.
He and the rest of the government seems to have thought that embracing the various Departmental Policies would fix everything. Then was sunrises to discover he was getting Continuity Sunak
This will be the most boring article ever published in the history of the Internet but I've come up with a snappy title to leaven the doughy misery of reading the fucking thing - "The Transgina Monologues".
The latest version of the article, including the links, appendices, sources and the discussant contributions, is just over 20,000 words long. That is one looooong monologue.
If energy prices soar then the underlying issue will be around a quarter of households literally won't be able to pay their energy bills. Once enough people stop paying that will snowball into a payment strike and the energy firms themselves won't be able to purchase enough energy to keep supply going.
I am generally very much against the "something needs to be done" line of thinking but energy prices at 2022 levels is rightly in that category. There are lots of different approaches but all come with political risks and costs. Those who think it can be left to a "free" market here are deluded.
You’ve probably pored over the overnight by-election results already but I couldn’t be bothered to scour the threads. In any case, they present a fairly clear pattern:
- Lib Dems consolidating in their heartlands and barely touched by surges in Reform support - Greens surging in the left wing urban areas (and in an inner suburb last night) at Lib Dem and Labour expense, but losing ground in rural areas - Reform replacing Tories on an almost like for like basis
This will be the most boring article ever published in the history of the Internet but I've come up with a snappy title to leaven the doughy misery of reading the fucking thing - "The Transgina Monologues".
The latest version of the article, including the links, appendices, sources and the discussant contributions, is just over 20,000 words long. That is one looooong monologue.
Hegseth previously fired those who gave their assessment last year of the original “ mission accomplished “ regarding Irans nuclear capability.
They were fired for not reporting what the Dear Leader wanted to hear .
Also Politico reported Tuesday.
According to them, the staff of the Pentagon department responsible for developing, analyzing, and implementing methods for protecting civilians in military operations, which previously had about 200 employees, has been reduced by 90 percent. And only one out of ten employees remains in a similar department of the US Central Command (CENTCOM).
These units were supposed to investigate the circumstances of the recent attack on a girls' school in Iran.
According to Politico, the aforesaid staff cuts made to these units have significantly reduced the US ability to protect civilians during the largest airstrike in decades.
America is led by morons.
The mission won't be semi-accomplished until ground troops take the uranium, at the very least.
The mission won't be fully accomplished until there is regime change, which will also probably need ground troops.
That's not a reason to end the conflict, it is a reason to go much harder and do it properly. Which they're too frit to do. Incompetents.
It's not that America is too afraid, it's that a ground invasion is essentially impossible. If they were to do it, they'd have to do it properly - invading the country and occupying it so the regime would not reconstitute itself or the nuclear program. That involves invasion and occupation.
Firstly, America just doesn't have enough soldiers. The liberation of Iraq in 2003 needed 200,000, so America might need half a million for this. The American frontline army is only 452,000, on active duty and it would need at least twice as many for its other simultaneous tasks, R&R, etc. so it would have to introduce conscription. And training the new, unwilling recruits would take a year.
Secondly, how do you get the troops there? A ground invasion of a country of 92 million people - four times the population of Iraq in 2003 - with still-loyal armed forces would need hundreds of thousands of troops. America doesn't have the landing craft for an amphibious assault on that scale, which would be 5-10x the size of D-Day. Manufacturing them would take a decade as America's shipbuilding capacity has atrophied since the end of the Cold War.
So it would have to be a ground invasion. Where from? None of Iran's neighbours are remotely likely to host US, let alone Israeli, ground troops on the scale necessary for the year or so it would take to get ready, all the while being exposed to Iranian attacks. Israel would be delighted to host American troops for an invasion of Iran, but it's too far away.
Thirdly, invading a country of 92 million is one thing. Occupying it is something else entirely. As I've mentioned on here before, a rule of thumb is that you need one soldier for every 20 people to hold down an unwilling country. That's 4.6 million to occupy Iran for who knows how long? Again, where are they to come from?
Fourthly, America is still a flawed democracy, albeit a flawed one, Wars need political support, especially if conscription will be necessary, and there's not much for an air campaign. For a ground invasion and occupation there would be none whatsoever.
So America isn't too afraid - it's sensible.
While that's right, are you taking into account the common sense of the Commander-in-Chief, one DJ Trump? Clearly, of course, we don't know what advice he's being given by the professional military he has, presumably, around him he doesn't appear to be behaving logically.
You can't subsidise your way out of a supply shock.
World energy supply has fallen. World energy demand needs to drop to match supply.
That's what the price is: it's information that tells you that you need to reduce demand. If you (and everyone else) tries to subsidise their way out of the supply shock, then all you do is make the remaining producers of that energy rich, without solving the problem.
Now: there are ways you can ... ameliorate ... a short term supply issue caused by the closure of the Straits of Hormuz. Your country might, if it had any sense, have six months of natural gas demand in storage that could be run down at times like this.
But the better, longer-term, plan is simply to have more energy produced in ways that simply aren't susceptible to the a reduction of natural gas an oil supply. (For what it's worth, coal doesnt help much. Why? Because energy for power generation is pretty fungible. If natural gas gets more expensive, then coal fired power stations get used more. Prices are set at the margin, so the price of coal will rise until -on a per megawatt hour basis- it comes into line with natural gas. Hence why Newcastle Coal prices are now a staggering $130+/ton.)
I would consider this shit show not worth the digit of, nevermind the life or limb of, a single British soldier. If I were the family members, I would be pissed.
If energy prices soar then the underlying issue will be around a quarter of households literally won't be able to pay their energy bills. Once enough people stop paying that will snowball into a payment strike and the energy firms themselves won't be able to purchase enough energy to keep supply going.
I am generally very much against the "something needs to be done" line of thinking but energy prices at 2022 levels is rightly in that category. There are lots of different approaches but all come with political risks and costs. Those who think it can be left to a "free" market here are deluded.
Natural gas prices are nowhere near 2022 levels. Oil is soaring of course, but petrol and diesel remain well below highs of the last decade, and lower on real terms than for most of my adult life.
So.. the economy is stalled.. Eds running round like a headless chicken saying he's going to stop oil companies profiting from higher prices.. without the faintest idea how to do so. Starmer's in deep deep shit over Mandelson where an apology won't cut it , the Defence sec is useless despite being suggested as an alternative to Starmer. Its all going so well...
Weak weak weak.
Reports that in the 100,000 documents to be released, including whats app messages, some senior labour mps will be embarrasingly compromised
You can't subsidise your way out of a supply shock.
World energy supply has fallen. World energy demand needs to drop to match supply.
That's what the price is: it's information that tells you that you need to reduce demand. If you (and everyone else) tries to subsidise their way out of the supply shock, then all you do is make the remaining producers of that energy rich, without solving the problem.
Now: there are ways you can ... ameliorate ... a short term supply issue caused by the closure of the Straits of Hormuz. Your country might, if it had any sense, have six months of natural gas demand in storage that could be run down at times like this.
But the better, longer-term, plan is simply to have more energy produced in ways that simply aren't susceptible to the a reduction of natural gas an oil supply. (For what it's worth, coal doesnt help much. Why? Because energy for power generation is pretty fungible. If natural gas gets more expensive, then coal fired power stations get used more. Prices are set at the margin, so the price of coal will rise until -on a per megawatt hour basis- it comes into line with natural gas. Hence why Newcastle Coal prices are now a staggering $130+/ton.)
And because of the way our electricity market works, the live UK price per MWh is £100 despite gas only accounting for 3.5gw of generation out of 38 on this windy, sunny day.
Which is why I find it genuinely depressing that, since devolution, we’ve had so little to show for it in the things that actually matter: health outcomes, education outcomes, housing, infrastructure delivery, addiction and mental health, local services that work, and the general sense that the state can still build and run things competently. Plenty of blame to go around across administrations, but after almost 19 years in power the SNP own the results.
There is a debate to be had about why the first Labour devolved administration was not as successful as hoped on that front, but the problem with the SNP is they are determined to prove that devolution can't be successful, which makes it hard for them to run a successful devolved administration...
The SNP are a protest party, a single issue nationalist campaigning group who have found themselves in power for the last 19 years with no idea what to do with it.
Come on then, give me your Unionist manifesto to make a success of devolution then.
The problem for Unionist parties in Scotland with devolution is that it has entirely infantilised them (and as sub branches being junior was always part of their nature). They constantly piss and moan about the EssEnnPee without providing any kind of an alternative prospectus except ‘well, we wouldn’t do that’. In addition having their head offices running non-devolved government for Scotland in perpetuity keeps them as barely developed embryos floating in the warm, amniotic fluid of the Union.
Sorry, went a bit Leon with the metaphors there.
did you read my post down-thread?
I did, a dearth of solid policy proposals but a lot of ‘just do things better’.
I recall one PBer (resident in England) saying that it was the SNP’s job to govern ‘superbly’ to make the case for an Indy Scotland. Since I can’t think of any recent national governments let alone devolved ones as a model for that level of attainment, it seems a bit unfair to single out the SNP for so much unrealistic expectation.
I don't think it's unfair in the slightest to lay the blame for the state of the nation I live in at the feet of those that have been in power for the best part of 20 years. I'm not in politics, so I don't have to provide you with anything like a solid policy proposal or unionist manifesto. I can point out everything and anything that the SNP does is wrong.
I reject your framing of politics in Scotland through the divisive and self-serving nationalist lens. I reject your tribal loyalty to any party over state and good governance.
but still, if you feel better about it you can just lump me in with the rest of the right wing unionist scum and ignore me.
Jeezo, talk about framing.
‘They’re doing it all wrong but I can’t say what they should do to make it right, and I’ve mentioned Unionist scum which means though that person never used that phrase they’re a vile Cybernat!’
Righty ho, I’ll lump you in with all the other rightwing Unionist MASSIVE snowflakes and ignore you henceforth.
If energy prices soar then the underlying issue will be around a quarter of households literally won't be able to pay their energy bills. Once enough people stop paying that will snowball into a payment strike and the energy firms themselves won't be able to purchase enough energy to keep supply going.
I am generally very much against the "something needs to be done" line of thinking but energy prices at 2022 levels is rightly in that category. There are lots of different approaches but all come with political risks and costs. Those who think it can be left to a "free" market here are deluded.
Natural gas prices are nowhere near 2022 levels. Oil is soaring of course, but petrol and diesel remain well below highs of the last decade, and lower on real terms than for most of my adult life.
In other news, a moment of clarity from my wife the other day, who reflected that politically we're pretty much Tories now. But could never admit it as would be ostracised and despised by friends and neighbours alike...
Quite frankly if friends or neighbours will ostracise you for supporting a mainstream party they ain’t worth shit.
My Reform supporting mates don’t ostracise me for voting Labour or vice versa.
We disagree, vehemently over Braverman, but we have so much that unites us.
Which is why I find it genuinely depressing that, since devolution, we’ve had so little to show for it in the things that actually matter: health outcomes, education outcomes, housing, infrastructure delivery, addiction and mental health, local services that work, and the general sense that the state can still build and run things competently. Plenty of blame to go around across administrations, but after almost 19 years in power the SNP own the results.
There is a debate to be had about why the first Labour devolved administration was not as successful as hoped on that front, but the problem with the SNP is they are determined to prove that devolution can't be successful, which makes it hard for them to run a successful devolved administration...
The SNP are a protest party, a single issue nationalist campaigning group who have found themselves in power for the last 19 years with no idea what to do with it.
Come on then, give me your Unionist manifesto to make a success of devolution then.
The problem for Unionist parties in Scotland with devolution is that it has entirely infantilised them (and as sub branches being junior was always part of their nature). They constantly piss and moan about the EssEnnPee without providing any kind of an alternative prospectus except ‘well, we wouldn’t do that’. In addition having their head offices running non-devolved government for Scotland in perpetuity keeps them as barely developed embryos floating in the warm, amniotic fluid of the Union.
Sorry, went a bit Leon with the metaphors there.
did you read my post down-thread?
I did, a dearth of solid policy proposals but a lot of ‘just do things better’.
I recall one PBer (resident in England) saying that it was the SNP’s job to govern ‘superbly’ to make the case for an Indy Scotland. Since I can’t think of any recent national governments let alone devolved ones as a model for that level of attainment, it seems a bit unfair to single out the SNP for so much unrealistic expectation.
I don't think it's unfair in the slightest to lay the blame for the state of the nation I live in at the feet of those that have been in power for the best part of 20 years. I'm not in politics, so I don't have to provide you with anything like a solid policy proposal or unionist manifesto. I can point out everything and anything that the SNP does is wrong.
I reject your framing of politics in Scotland through the divisive and self-serving nationalist lens. I reject your tribal loyalty to any party over state and good governance.
but still, if you feel better about it you can just lump me in with the rest of the right wing unionist scum and ignore me.
Jeezo, talk about framing.
‘They’re doing it all wrong but I can’t say what they should do to make it right, and I’ve mentioned Unionist scum which means though that person never used that phrase they’re a vile Cybernat!’
Righty ho, I’ll lump you in with all the other rightwing Unionist MASSIVE snowflakes and ignore you henceforth.
A fascinating example of the self-annealing world view.
The idea that criticism of government policies is only allowed if you present alternatives is classic.
@RochdalePioneers lives in Scotland and has been involved in Scottish politics so I would trust his observatiins before a southern Englishman who has not lived there
Polling is the same even on Mars
You sure about that?
Syria Planum North Ward – Martian Municipal Elections (Conducted under the Interplanetary Local Governance Act, 2087)
Electorate: 3,842 registered residents Turnout: 2,119 (55.1%) Rejected ballots: 17 (14 marked “None of these, bring back the rovers”, 3 eaten by a small maintenance drone)
Syria Planum North Ward – Martian Municipal Elections
Electorate: 3,842
Turnout: 2,119 (55.1%)
Rejected ballots: 17
14 marked “None of these, bring back the rovers”
3 eaten by a small maintenance drone
Candidate
Party
Votes
Result
Dr. Valentina Crater
Progressive Terraforming Party
812
Elected
Reg “Dusty” Halvorsen
Independent (Keep Mars Red)
601
Lila-7 Autonomous Unit
Robot Residents Association
423
Trevor Biggs
Earth Heritage Conservatives
198
“Gary” (Actual Martian Rock)
Protest Candidate
68
Majority: 211 over Reg “Dusty” Halvorsen
Swing: +7.4% toward the Progressive Terraforming Party since the 2083 by-election.
Terrible, terrible development. Israel began striking Lebanese state infrastructure. This infrastructure is used not just by Hezbollah, but also by Lebanese civilians, most of whom oppose Hezbollah.
Collective punishment is wrong; it also helps Hezbollah, which is more isolated than ever domestically in Lebanon, facing unprecedented popular fury even inside the Shia sect, for dragging Lebanon into war. Collectively punishing the Lebanese may push more of them toward supporting "resistance" in the face of indiscriminate aggression.
The genocidal cnut has no brake, no off buttom, its genicide of Arabs, full stop.
He'll use the tired old "weeding out the terrorists" to carpet / blanket bomb anything that stands up. Just look at Gaza.
They won't let anyone in and they wil quite happilly build a massive buffer zone around Israel.
The time has to come when he is hunted down, taken out and until he is, Israel must be sanctioned and ostracised in the same way as Russia. He is no better than Putin, in many ways he is far worse than Putin.
"as bad as Pol Pot" . . . "far worse than Putin"
Your moral compass is completely broken.
The Cambodian genocide by Pol Pot, were skulls were literally piled high led to between 2 - 3 million deaths and a quarter to a third of the population wiped out.
Putin invaded a free, democratic country that was neither threatening nor attacking Russia in a pure unadulterated war of aggression.
Netanyahu's Israel has only fought against groups or countries that attacked Israel first.
You may not like the way the wars are fought, that is reasonable. But to suggest that it is as bad as Pol Pot, or worse than Putin, says you are either being completely ignorant of what the latter two did or you have a very broken moral compass.
You are apologising for a mass murderer.
No ifs no buts
His sole aim is to kill anyone who he deems a threat, even if 99.8% are not threats.
Until he is removed there will be no peace in the ME
Killing threats is legitimate just war, so long as you are proportionate in doing so.
Ukraine was never a threat to Russia, so there was absolutely no justification whatsoever for Russia to invade. Hamas and Hezbollah are threats to Israel as even you have to admit.
There will be peace when there are no more threats.
Regime change in Iran would go a long way to accomplishing that.
The IDF shows a pretty reckless disregard for civilians.
On Reeves witterings about clamping down on energy suppliers who charge higher prices when there is falling supply:
Stephen Bush @stephenkb.bsky.social · 4m This bizarre gulf between the self-conception of Starmer-Reeves as Tough Guys Who Make Hard Decisions and the practice of “what if we had a pick and mix of the easy and wrong rhetoric from the right *and* the easy and wrong rhetoric from the left?”
@RochdalePioneers lives in Scotland and has been involved in Scottish politics so I would trust his observatiins before a southern Englishman who has not lived there
Polling is the same even on Mars
You sure about that?
Syria Planum North Ward – Martian Municipal Elections (Conducted under the Interplanetary Local Governance Act, 2087)
Electorate: 3,842 registered residents Turnout: 2,119 (55.1%) Rejected ballots: 17 (14 marked “None of these, bring back the rovers”, 3 eaten by a small maintenance drone)
Syria Planum North Ward – Martian Municipal Elections
Electorate: 3,842
Turnout: 2,119 (55.1%)
Rejected ballots: 17
14 marked “None of these, bring back the rovers”
3 eaten by a small maintenance drone
Candidate
Party
Votes
Result
Dr. Valentina Crater
Progressive Terraforming Party
812
Elected
Reg “Dusty” Halvorsen
Independent (Keep Mars Red)
601
Lila-7 Autonomous Unit
Robot Residents Association
423
Trevor Biggs
Earth Heritage Conservatives
198
“Gary” (Actual Martian Rock)
Protest Candidate
68
Majority: 211 over Reg “Dusty” Halvorsen
Swing: +7.4% toward the Progressive Terraforming Party since the 2083 by-election.
If energy prices soar then the underlying issue will be around a quarter of households literally won't be able to pay their energy bills. Once enough people stop paying that will snowball into a payment strike and the energy firms themselves won't be able to purchase enough energy to keep supply going.
I am generally very much against the "something needs to be done" line of thinking but energy prices at 2022 levels is rightly in that category. There are lots of different approaches but all come with political risks and costs. Those who think it can be left to a "free" market here are deluded.
It will be summer soon. I have already had one day when the central heating didn't come on. The idea you might be able to economise seems to escape some people. Eat salads and cold food. Decommission the big freezer. Turn lights off. If the heating is still on, turn it off when you go out. Turn it off at night, that's what bedclothes are for. Reduce driving - go shopping on foot, replace leisure activities with those close to home, tell the teenagers to walk home. As rcs1000 says, prices are sending us a message.
Netanyahu: The war in Iran is turning Israel into a "global superpower."
So it’s not just Trump and Another Richard that are totally tonto.
Perhaps you would prefer it I would cheer along and wave the pompoms.
Okay then.
Joe Biden is fit for office. Hunter Biden is a victim of a political witch hunt. Even if Hunter Biden is guilty he will never be given a presidential pardon. The prosecutions of Trump are masterpieces of legal planning. Trump cannot win because his crowds are so small. Dems never gerrymander.
Alternatively I'll keep pointing out the occasional uncomfortable truth.
And you know why that's important ?
Because when groupthink become obligatory people stop thinking.
Merely repeating Trump’s lies sometimes mingled with half truths does not make them truths, uncomfortable or otherwise. And I might point out those were not what you have been saying above, so are essentially whataboutery.
And do you know why it’s important to call that out? Or am I justified in my comment on your mental state?
(The irony is one of the things you have written there is undoubtedly true!)
Stop your bleating and open your mind.
Saying that Joe Biden was unfit for office or that Hunter Biden was a criminal who received a presidential pardon or that the Dems gerrymander are not Trump's lies nor are they half truths.
They are verifiable facts which you are now denying.
You need to accept that we are not in a Manichean world but one of multiple shades where there are inconvenient facts and open minded analysis is required to better understand it.
Last evening I believe I comprehensively rebutted one of your pro- Trump, anti- Biden posts. A post you did not respond to.
The reason Biden needed to pardon Hunter Biden and pre-empt prosecutions against himself and people like Fauci was because Trump is so malign and vindictive. It is quite ironic really as one of my rebuttal points was that Merrick Garland and by definition the Biden administration did absolutely nothing to chase down Trump's Epstein criminality nor did they progress Trump's sedition charge at any reasonable pace.
Apologies I do not have the time and opportunity to respond to every post.
What we have with some people is an effortless shift in their narrative from "X will never be done" to "It is right that X has been done".
Examples being Hunter Biden's pardon or Dem gerrymandering.
What Trump causes in some people is a Manichean mentality.
Some people will declare that "Trump was right about everything" and even wear a hat to show their obsession, while others will shift into some "Trump was wrong about everything" mania which leads them to disagreeing with everything Trump has said or done and also claiming that his opponents were always doing the right thing.
So while Trump is a monstrous malignant narcissist who is corrupt, crude, abusive, erratic and totally unfit for office he has been correct about some issues.
Such issues including:
Europe needs to spend more on defence Energy security is important The benefits of economic growth have not been fairly shared in recent decades Uncontrolled immigration is leading to socioeconomic problems
And it is because Trump has highlighted such issues that he was elected twice.
Where it is justifiable to criticise Trump is his actions in response to those issues. These actions generally being badly planned and badly applied.
Likewise Trump being unfit for office doesn't change the fact that Joe Biden was also unfit for office.
The 'our side right, your side wrong' mentality of US politics has led to almost the entire political body of both parties proclaiming that a man who was unfit for office was fit for office. The only difference being that one half said that Biden was fit for office and the other half said that Trump was fit for office. When neither were.
That is the disgrace of the US political system and I do like to see it echoed on PB.
I don't disagree that in the Grand scheme of things US politics has been broken for decades. I cited Joe Kennedy buying the 1960 election for JFK. However Trump is on a different scale even to Nixon in terms of corruption.
On the points you raise.
Europe needs to spend more on defence. Largely true, however Trump's adjacency to Putin have made this more urgent.
Energy security is important. However new renewable technologies which would see the decline of fossil fuels have been jettisoned, not lest because Trump is in the debt of Exxon- Mobil and Texaxo.
The benefits of economic growth have not been fairly shared in recent decades. Absolutely true, but Trump's response has been to cut taxes for the wealthiest, particularly the super rich.
Uncontrolled immigration is leading to socioeconomic problems. This is indeed true both over here and in the US. Immigration has however been weaponised in the US to the degree of White Supremacy. Hence the current (some would say) lawless action of DHS ( and ICE).
Even when Trump has a point, his remedy is invariably cruel.
The rumours from earlier months were true: two more missing episodes have been found. They are Eps 1 and 3 of The Dalek's Master Plan, a 12-part serial from 1965.
The missing episodes were part of the private collection mentioned by Film is Fabulous! earlier.
Indeed. But PV has said on GB this was a bonus find. There are others.
Is this Tim Beddows collection or someone else’s ? We know Tim Beddows had two missing DW and the estate was held up by his business partner. As he had debts assets would be sold to clear them. He also had missing Public Eye.
Or is it someone else’s and that is still to come ?
Which is why I find it genuinely depressing that, since devolution, we’ve had so little to show for it in the things that actually matter: health outcomes, education outcomes, housing, infrastructure delivery, addiction and mental health, local services that work, and the general sense that the state can still build and run things competently. Plenty of blame to go around across administrations, but after almost 19 years in power the SNP own the results.
There is a debate to be had about why the first Labour devolved administration was not as successful as hoped on that front, but the problem with the SNP is they are determined to prove that devolution can't be successful, which makes it hard for them to run a successful devolved administration...
The SNP are a protest party, a single issue nationalist campaigning group who have found themselves in power for the last 19 years with no idea what to do with it.
Come on then, give me your Unionist manifesto to make a success of devolution then.
The problem for Unionist parties in Scotland with devolution is that it has entirely infantilised them (and as sub branches being junior was always part of their nature). They constantly piss and moan about the EssEnnPee without providing any kind of an alternative prospectus except ‘well, we wouldn’t do that’. In addition having their head offices running non-devolved government for Scotland in perpetuity keeps them as barely developed embryos floating in the warm, amniotic fluid of the Union.
Sorry, went a bit Leon with the metaphors there.
did you read my post down-thread?
I did, a dearth of solid policy proposals but a lot of ‘just do things better’.
I recall one PBer (resident in England) saying that it was the SNP’s job to govern ‘superbly’ to make the case for an Indy Scotland. Since I can’t think of any recent national governments let alone devolved ones as a model for that level of attainment, it seems a bit unfair to single out the SNP for so much unrealistic expectation.
I don't think it's unfair in the slightest to lay the blame for the state of the nation I live in at the feet of those that have been in power for the best part of 20 years. I'm not in politics, so I don't have to provide you with anything like a solid policy proposal or unionist manifesto. I can point out everything and anything that the SNP does is wrong.
I reject your framing of politics in Scotland through the divisive and self-serving nationalist lens. I reject your tribal loyalty to any party over state and good governance.
but still, if you feel better about it you can just lump me in with the rest of the right wing unionist scum and ignore me.
Jeezo, talk about framing.
‘They’re doing it all wrong but I can’t say what they should do to make it right, and I’ve mentioned Unionist scum which means though that person never used that phrase they’re a vile Cybernat!’
Righty ho, I’ll lump you in with all the other rightwing Unionist MASSIVE snowflakes and ignore you henceforth.
A fascinating example of the self-annealing world view.
The idea that criticism of government policies is only allowed if you present alternatives is classic.
Many thanks for holding back on an anecdote. Who made me the person that allows criticism? People can say any old shit on here they like as is proved daily, and others can treat it with the contempt it deserves, them’s the only rules.
@RochdalePioneers lives in Scotland and has been involved in Scottish politics so I would trust his observatiins before a southern Englishman who has not lived there
Polling is the same even on Mars
You sure about that?
Syria Planum North Ward – Martian Municipal Elections (Conducted under the Interplanetary Local Governance Act, 2087)
Electorate: 3,842 registered residents Turnout: 2,119 (55.1%) Rejected ballots: 17 (14 marked “None of these, bring back the rovers”, 3 eaten by a small maintenance drone)
Syria Planum North Ward – Martian Municipal Elections
Electorate: 3,842
Turnout: 2,119 (55.1%)
Rejected ballots: 17
14 marked “None of these, bring back the rovers”
3 eaten by a small maintenance drone
Candidate
Party
Votes
Result
Dr. Valentina Crater
Progressive Terraforming Party
812
Elected
Reg “Dusty” Halvorsen
Independent (Keep Mars Red)
601
Lila-7 Autonomous Unit
Robot Residents Association
423
Trevor Biggs
Earth Heritage Conservatives
198
“Gary” (Actual Martian Rock)
Protest Candidate
68
Majority: 211 over Reg “Dusty” Halvorsen
Swing: +7.4% toward the Progressive Terraforming Party since the 2083 by-election.
What, no Belter Liberation Front?
They are banned on Mars. OPA terrorists.
No sign yet of that big new job for Mandelson. You probably want to cancel the bet - but sorry no can do.
More money pointlessly wasted subsidizing energy consumption rather than invested in energy efficiency of UK housing stock (insulation etc).
It’s simply silly, and I’m pretty disappointed the Lib Dems are going along with the lazy calls for the government to bail out consumers with money they don’t have.
Our electricity and heating prices are too high, but we’re heading into spring and we need market reform not giveaways. And pump prices are now some of the cheapest in Western Europe. Petrol is over €2 per litre in France now.
Absolutely. I'm campaigning for the LDs in Birmingham, and I find it extremely hard to defend this sort of crap. The last thing we need to do is tax labour to subsidise energy consumption.
@RochdalePioneers lives in Scotland and has been involved in Scottish politics so I would trust his observatiins before a southern Englishman who has not lived there
Polling is the same even on Mars
You sure about that?
Syria Planum North Ward – Martian Municipal Elections (Conducted under the Interplanetary Local Governance Act, 2087)
Electorate: 3,842 registered residents Turnout: 2,119 (55.1%) Rejected ballots: 17 (14 marked “None of these, bring back the rovers”, 3 eaten by a small maintenance drone)
Syria Planum North Ward – Martian Municipal Elections
Electorate: 3,842
Turnout: 2,119 (55.1%)
Rejected ballots: 17
14 marked “None of these, bring back the rovers”
3 eaten by a small maintenance drone
Candidate
Party
Votes
Result
Dr. Valentina Crater
Progressive Terraforming Party
812
Elected
Reg “Dusty” Halvorsen
Independent (Keep Mars Red)
601
Lila-7 Autonomous Unit
Robot Residents Association
423
Trevor Biggs
Earth Heritage Conservatives
198
“Gary” (Actual Martian Rock)
Protest Candidate
68
Majority: 211 over Reg “Dusty” Halvorsen
Swing: +7.4% toward the Progressive Terraforming Party since the 2083 by-election.
What, no Belter Liberation Front?
They are banned on Mars. OPA terrorists.
No sign yet of that big new job for Mandelson. You probably want to cancel the bet - but sorry no can do.
2 1/2 years is a long time.
Mandelson will probably make a bid for the Viceroy of Mars, by then
If energy prices soar then the underlying issue will be around a quarter of households literally won't be able to pay their energy bills. Once enough people stop paying that will snowball into a payment strike and the energy firms themselves won't be able to purchase enough energy to keep supply going.
I am generally very much against the "something needs to be done" line of thinking but energy prices at 2022 levels is rightly in that category. There are lots of different approaches but all come with political risks and costs. Those who think it can be left to a "free" market here are deluded.
It will be summer soon. I have already had one day when the central heating didn't come on. The idea you might be able to economise seems to escape some people. Eat salads and cold food. Decommission the big freezer. Turn lights off. If the heating is still on, turn it off when you go out. Turn it off at night, that's what bedclothes are for. Reduce driving - go shopping on foot, replace leisure activities with those close to home, tell the teenagers to walk home. As rcs1000 says, prices are sending us a message.
All this is true, but it doesnt change the chain of events that will happen if prices went to 2022 levels (as others have pointed out, nowhere near them presently) without govt support:
Significant proportion of households can't pay. Others will stop paying. Suppliers hit cash flow problems and can't afford to buy energy. Government forced to step in anyway.
Which is why I find it genuinely depressing that, since devolution, we’ve had so little to show for it in the things that actually matter: health outcomes, education outcomes, housing, infrastructure delivery, addiction and mental health, local services that work, and the general sense that the state can still build and run things competently. Plenty of blame to go around across administrations, but after almost 19 years in power the SNP own the results.
There is a debate to be had about why the first Labour devolved administration was not as successful as hoped on that front, but the problem with the SNP is they are determined to prove that devolution can't be successful, which makes it hard for them to run a successful devolved administration...
The SNP are a protest party, a single issue nationalist campaigning group who have found themselves in power for the last 19 years with no idea what to do with it.
Come on then, give me your Unionist manifesto to make a success of devolution then.
The problem for Unionist parties in Scotland with devolution is that it has entirely infantilised them (and as sub branches being junior was always part of their nature). They constantly piss and moan about the EssEnnPee without providing any kind of an alternative prospectus except ‘well, we wouldn’t do that’. In addition having their head offices running non-devolved government for Scotland in perpetuity keeps them as barely developed embryos floating in the warm, amniotic fluid of the Union.
Sorry, went a bit Leon with the metaphors there.
did you read my post down-thread?
I did, a dearth of solid policy proposals but a lot of ‘just do things better’.
I recall one PBer (resident in England) saying that it was the SNP’s job to govern ‘superbly’ to make the case for an Indy Scotland. Since I can’t think of any recent national governments let alone devolved ones as a model for that level of attainment, it seems a bit unfair to single out the SNP for so much unrealistic expectation.
I don't think it's unfair in the slightest to lay the blame for the state of the nation I live in at the feet of those that have been in power for the best part of 20 years. I'm not in politics, so I don't have to provide you with anything like a solid policy proposal or unionist manifesto. I can point out everything and anything that the SNP does is wrong.
I reject your framing of politics in Scotland through the divisive and self-serving nationalist lens. I reject your tribal loyalty to any party over state and good governance.
but still, if you feel better about it you can just lump me in with the rest of the right wing unionist scum and ignore me.
Jeezo, talk about framing.
‘They’re doing it all wrong but I can’t say what they should do to make it right, and I’ve mentioned Unionist scum which means though that person never used that phrase they’re a vile Cybernat!’
Righty ho, I’ll lump you in with all the other rightwing Unionist MASSIVE snowflakes and ignore you henceforth.
A fascinating example of the self-annealing world view.
The idea that criticism of government policies is only allowed if you present alternatives is classic.
Many thanks for holding back on an anecdote. Who made me the person that allows criticism? People can say any old shit on here they like as is proved daily, and others can treat it with the contempt it deserves, them’s the only rules.
Contempt for criticism just means getting closer and closer to Liz Truss.
Have been too busy talking politics this morning (as a distraction from business) to post replies on here. In summary - part of why the Tories are now appealing is simply because the worst of their repellant morons have defected to Reform...
If energy prices soar then the underlying issue will be around a quarter of households literally won't be able to pay their energy bills. Once enough people stop paying that will snowball into a payment strike and the energy firms themselves won't be able to purchase enough energy to keep supply going.
I am generally very much against the "something needs to be done" line of thinking but energy prices at 2022 levels is rightly in that category. There are lots of different approaches but all come with political risks and costs. Those who think it can be left to a "free" market here are deluded.
It will be summer soon. I have already had one day when the central heating didn't come on. The idea you might be able to economise seems to escape some people. Eat salads and cold food. Decommission the big freezer. Turn lights off. If the heating is still on, turn it off when you go out. Turn it off at night, that's what bedclothes are for. Reduce driving - go shopping on foot, replace leisure activities with those close to home, tell the teenagers to walk home. As rcs1000 says, prices are sending us a message.
All this is true, but it doesnt change the chain of events that will happen if prices went to 2022 levels (as others have pointed out, nowhere near them presently) without govt support:
Significant proportion of households can't pay. Others will stop paying. Suppliers hit cash flow problems and can't afford to buy energy. Government forced to step in anyway.
The logical thing to do would be to give money to those who are struggling rather than artificially reduce energy prices. That would stop people from freezing but still provide an incentive to reduce energy use.
Which is why I find it genuinely depressing that, since devolution, we’ve had so little to show for it in the things that actually matter: health outcomes, education outcomes, housing, infrastructure delivery, addiction and mental health, local services that work, and the general sense that the state can still build and run things competently. Plenty of blame to go around across administrations, but after almost 19 years in power the SNP own the results.
There is a debate to be had about why the first Labour devolved administration was not as successful as hoped on that front, but the problem with the SNP is they are determined to prove that devolution can't be successful, which makes it hard for them to run a successful devolved administration...
The SNP are a protest party, a single issue nationalist campaigning group who have found themselves in power for the last 19 years with no idea what to do with it.
Come on then, give me your Unionist manifesto to make a success of devolution then.
The problem for Unionist parties in Scotland with devolution is that it has entirely infantilised them (and as sub branches being junior was always part of their nature). They constantly piss and moan about the EssEnnPee without providing any kind of an alternative prospectus except ‘well, we wouldn’t do that’. In addition having their head offices running non-devolved government for Scotland in perpetuity keeps them as barely developed embryos floating in the warm, amniotic fluid of the Union.
Sorry, went a bit Leon with the metaphors there.
did you read my post down-thread?
I did, a dearth of solid policy proposals but a lot of ‘just do things better’.
I recall one PBer (resident in England) saying that it was the SNP’s job to govern ‘superbly’ to make the case for an Indy Scotland. Since I can’t think of any recent national governments let alone devolved ones as a model for that level of attainment, it seems a bit unfair to single out the SNP for so much unrealistic expectation.
That's an extraordinary lack of ambition. The normal expectation for any democratic government, whether devolved or not, is that they run everything they are charged with running very well.
The stuff people want run well is the ordinary non party political stuff of government - health, education, civil administration of stuff, roads, infrastructure, and so on. 'Superb', while ambitious, is a good term for government's aspiration.
What better way of making the case for Scottish independence can there be than by showing how it's done? No stunts, no wheezes, no excuses, just do it well.
If energy prices soar then the underlying issue will be around a quarter of households literally won't be able to pay their energy bills. Once enough people stop paying that will snowball into a payment strike and the energy firms themselves won't be able to purchase enough energy to keep supply going.
I am generally very much against the "something needs to be done" line of thinking but energy prices at 2022 levels is rightly in that category. There are lots of different approaches but all come with political risks and costs. Those who think it can be left to a "free" market here are deluded.
It will be summer soon. I have already had one day when the central heating didn't come on. The idea you might be able to economise seems to escape some people. Eat salads and cold food. Decommission the big freezer. Turn lights off. If the heating is still on, turn it off when you go out. Turn it off at night, that's what bedclothes are for. Reduce driving - go shopping on foot, replace leisure activities with those close to home, tell the teenagers to walk home. As rcs1000 says, prices are sending us a message.
All this is true, but it doesnt change the chain of events that will happen if prices went to 2022 levels (as others have pointed out, nowhere near them presently) without govt support:
Significant proportion of households can't pay. Others will stop paying. Suppliers hit cash flow problems and can't afford to buy energy. Government forced to step in anyway.
The logical thing to do would be to give money to those who are struggling rather than artificially reduce energy prices. That would stop people from freezing but still provide an incentive to reduce energy use.
If energy prices soar then the underlying issue will be around a quarter of households literally won't be able to pay their energy bills. Once enough people stop paying that will snowball into a payment strike and the energy firms themselves won't be able to purchase enough energy to keep supply going.
I am generally very much against the "something needs to be done" line of thinking but energy prices at 2022 levels is rightly in that category. There are lots of different approaches but all come with political risks and costs. Those who think it can be left to a "free" market here are deluded.
Subsiding energy prices is a really inefficient way to do it though, for two reasons:
1) Energy consumption correlates closely with income. The richest households burn much more gas and petrol/diesel than poorer ones. The exception is electricity, as a percentage of household income, though that will change with EVs rolling out. It's a fiscal transfer from poor, working households in small flats to rich, non-working households in large detached houses.
2) The incentives are all wrong. By protecting consumers from these hikes we are sending a signal that they don't need to switch away from fossil fuels, or make their homes more efficient. Over the long term it actually increases our exposure to these crises.
So, I'd suggest a temporary uplift to the standard allowance of UC and to Pension Credit, if anything.
If energy prices soar then the underlying issue will be around a quarter of households literally won't be able to pay their energy bills. Once enough people stop paying that will snowball into a payment strike and the energy firms themselves won't be able to purchase enough energy to keep supply going.
I am generally very much against the "something needs to be done" line of thinking but energy prices at 2022 levels is rightly in that category. There are lots of different approaches but all come with political risks and costs. Those who think it can be left to a "free" market here are deluded.
It will be summer soon. I have already had one day when the central heating didn't come on. The idea you might be able to economise seems to escape some people. Eat salads and cold food. Decommission the big freezer. Turn lights off. If the heating is still on, turn it off when you go out. Turn it off at night, that's what bedclothes are for. Reduce driving - go shopping on foot, replace leisure activities with those close to home, tell the teenagers to walk home. As rcs1000 says, prices are sending us a message.
All this is true, but it doesnt change the chain of events that will happen if prices went to 2022 levels (as others have pointed out, nowhere near them presently) without govt support:
Significant proportion of households can't pay. Others will stop paying. Suppliers hit cash flow problems and can't afford to buy energy. Government forced to step in anyway.
Add “stock profits” to the nonsense bingo card for the coming days.
If energy prices soar then the underlying issue will be around a quarter of households literally won't be able to pay their energy bills. Once enough people stop paying that will snowball into a payment strike and the energy firms themselves won't be able to purchase enough energy to keep supply going.
I am generally very much against the "something needs to be done" line of thinking but energy prices at 2022 levels is rightly in that category. There are lots of different approaches but all come with political risks and costs. Those who think it can be left to a "free" market here are deluded.
It will be summer soon. I have already had one day when the central heating didn't come on. The idea you might be able to economise seems to escape some people. Eat salads and cold food. Decommission the big freezer. Turn lights off. If the heating is still on, turn it off when you go out. Turn it off at night, that's what bedclothes are for. Reduce driving - go shopping on foot, replace leisure activities with those close to home, tell the teenagers to walk home. As rcs1000 says, prices are sending us a message.
All this is true, but it doesnt change the chain of events that will happen if prices went to 2022 levels (as others have pointed out, nowhere near them presently) without govt support:
Significant proportion of households can't pay. Others will stop paying. Suppliers hit cash flow problems and can't afford to buy energy. Government forced to step in anyway.
The logical thing to do would be to give money to those who are struggling rather than artificially reduce energy prices. That would stop people from freezing but still provide an incentive to reduce energy use.
Define struggling, please?
I'd do it just as Eabhal suggests. Temporarily raise UC and Pension Credit.
Edit: Or it might be better politically to call it some sort of fuel allowance, but there'd be no requirement to spend it on fuel.
If energy prices soar then the underlying issue will be around a quarter of households literally won't be able to pay their energy bills. Once enough people stop paying that will snowball into a payment strike and the energy firms themselves won't be able to purchase enough energy to keep supply going.
I am generally very much against the "something needs to be done" line of thinking but energy prices at 2022 levels is rightly in that category. There are lots of different approaches but all come with political risks and costs. Those who think it can be left to a "free" market here are deluded.
It will be summer soon. I have already had one day when the central heating didn't come on. The idea you might be able to economise seems to escape some people. Eat salads and cold food. Decommission the big freezer. Turn lights off. If the heating is still on, turn it off when you go out. Turn it off at night, that's what bedclothes are for. Reduce driving - go shopping on foot, replace leisure activities with those close to home, tell the teenagers to walk home. As rcs1000 says, prices are sending us a message.
All this is true, but it doesnt change the chain of events that will happen if prices went to 2022 levels (as others have pointed out, nowhere near them presently) without govt support:
Significant proportion of households can't pay. Others will stop paying. Suppliers hit cash flow problems and can't afford to buy energy. Government forced to step in anyway.
The logical thing to do would be to give money to those who are struggling rather than artificially reduce energy prices. That would stop people from freezing but still provide an incentive to reduce energy use.
What if they don't spend it on energy but something else, and still don't pay their energy bills? *
Truss vs Rishi campaigned strongly against energy subsidies with all the same arguments that make a lot of theoretical sense but practically don't resolve the issue. Once in power she realised she had no option and actually went further than Rishi was suggesting.
* It is not just their problem, because the process for cutting them off is slow, not going to cope with the numbers and politically damaging. It is not just the suppliers problem either as they legally can't just supply people who pay, and without being paid they can't keep buying the energy for those who do pay.
@RochdalePioneers lives in Scotland and has been involved in Scottish politics so I would trust his observatiins before a southern Englishman who has not lived there
Polling is the same even on Mars
You sure about that?
Syria Planum North Ward – Martian Municipal Elections (Conducted under the Interplanetary Local Governance Act, 2087)
Electorate: 3,842 registered residents Turnout: 2,119 (55.1%) Rejected ballots: 17 (14 marked “None of these, bring back the rovers”, 3 eaten by a small maintenance drone)
Syria Planum North Ward – Martian Municipal Elections
Electorate: 3,842
Turnout: 2,119 (55.1%)
Rejected ballots: 17
14 marked “None of these, bring back the rovers”
3 eaten by a small maintenance drone
Candidate
Party
Votes
Result
Dr. Valentina Crater
Progressive Terraforming Party
812
Elected
Reg “Dusty” Halvorsen
Independent (Keep Mars Red)
601
Lila-7 Autonomous Unit
Robot Residents Association
423
Trevor Biggs
Earth Heritage Conservatives
198
“Gary” (Actual Martian Rock)
Protest Candidate
68
Majority: 211 over Reg “Dusty” Halvorsen
Swing: +7.4% toward the Progressive Terraforming Party since the 2083 by-election.
What, no Belter Liberation Front?
They are banned on Mars. OPA terrorists.
No sign yet of that big new job for Mandelson. You probably want to cancel the bet - but sorry no can do.
2 1/2 years is a long time.
Mandelson will probably make a bid for the Viceroy of Mars, by then
It is a long time but it's made up of days (as Larkin said) and this day brings no top job bounceback for the POD. That's all we can say right now.
Crazy footage from yesterday in the Nineveh Governorate of Northern Iraq, close to the Kurdish-majority city of Erbil, showing an American Low-Cost Uncrewed Combat Attack System (LUCAS), a copycat of the Iranian Shahed-136, striking a building utilized by Iraq’s Iranian-backed Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF).
If energy prices soar then the underlying issue will be around a quarter of households literally won't be able to pay their energy bills. Once enough people stop paying that will snowball into a payment strike and the energy firms themselves won't be able to purchase enough energy to keep supply going.
I am generally very much against the "something needs to be done" line of thinking but energy prices at 2022 levels is rightly in that category. There are lots of different approaches but all come with political risks and costs. Those who think it can be left to a "free" market here are deluded.
It will be summer soon. I have already had one day when the central heating didn't come on. The idea you might be able to economise seems to escape some people. Eat salads and cold food. Decommission the big freezer. Turn lights off. If the heating is still on, turn it off when you go out. Turn it off at night, that's what bedclothes are for. Reduce driving - go shopping on foot, replace leisure activities with those close to home, tell the teenagers to walk home. As rcs1000 says, prices are sending us a message.
The downside of Compo/Citizens' Charter Britain.
Whenever something goes wrong, it's always up to someone to make it right, preferably with money.
That the money has to come from somewhere is filed in the *too difficult" tray.
@RochdalePioneers lives in Scotland and has been involved in Scottish politics so I would trust his observatiins before a southern Englishman who has not lived there
Polling is the same even on Mars
You sure about that?
Syria Planum North Ward – Martian Municipal Elections (Conducted under the Interplanetary Local Governance Act, 2087)
Electorate: 3,842 registered residents Turnout: 2,119 (55.1%) Rejected ballots: 17 (14 marked “None of these, bring back the rovers”, 3 eaten by a small maintenance drone)
Syria Planum North Ward – Martian Municipal Elections
Electorate: 3,842
Turnout: 2,119 (55.1%)
Rejected ballots: 17
14 marked “None of these, bring back the rovers”
3 eaten by a small maintenance drone
Candidate
Party
Votes
Result
Dr. Valentina Crater
Progressive Terraforming Party
812
Elected
Reg “Dusty” Halvorsen
Independent (Keep Mars Red)
601
Lila-7 Autonomous Unit
Robot Residents Association
423
Trevor Biggs
Earth Heritage Conservatives
198
“Gary” (Actual Martian Rock)
Protest Candidate
68
Majority: 211 over Reg “Dusty” Halvorsen
Swing: +7.4% toward the Progressive Terraforming Party since the 2083 by-election.
What, no Belter Liberation Front?
They are banned on Mars. OPA terrorists.
No sign yet of that big new job for Mandelson. You probably want to cancel the bet - but sorry no can do.
2 1/2 years is a long time.
Mandelson will probably make a bid for the Viceroy of Mars, by then
It is a long time but it's made up of days (as Larkin said) and this day brings no top job bounceback for the POD. That's all we can say right now.
Mandelson is plotting his return right now.
He may have been reduced to black goo in the basement of Morgoths spare winter chalet, but he’s not gone.
Which is why I find it genuinely depressing that, since devolution, we’ve had so little to show for it in the things that actually matter: health outcomes, education outcomes, housing, infrastructure delivery, addiction and mental health, local services that work, and the general sense that the state can still build and run things competently. Plenty of blame to go around across administrations, but after almost 19 years in power the SNP own the results.
There is a debate to be had about why the first Labour devolved administration was not as successful as hoped on that front, but the problem with the SNP is they are determined to prove that devolution can't be successful, which makes it hard for them to run a successful devolved administration...
The SNP are a protest party, a single issue nationalist campaigning group who have found themselves in power for the last 19 years with no idea what to do with it.
Come on then, give me your Unionist manifesto to make a success of devolution then.
The problem for Unionist parties in Scotland with devolution is that it has entirely infantilised them (and as sub branches being junior was always part of their nature). They constantly piss and moan about the EssEnnPee without providing any kind of an alternative prospectus except ‘well, we wouldn’t do that’. In addition having their head offices running non-devolved government for Scotland in perpetuity keeps them as barely developed embryos floating in the warm, amniotic fluid of the Union.
Sorry, went a bit Leon with the metaphors there.
did you read my post down-thread?
I did, a dearth of solid policy proposals but a lot of ‘just do things better’.
I recall one PBer (resident in England) saying that it was the SNP’s job to govern ‘superbly’ to make the case for an Indy Scotland. Since I can’t think of any recent national governments let alone devolved ones as a model for that level of attainment, it seems a bit unfair to single out the SNP for so much unrealistic expectation.
That's an extraordinary lack of ambition. The normal expectation for any democratic government, whether devolved or not, is that they run everything they are charged with running very well.
The stuff people want run well is the ordinary non party political stuff of government - health, education, civil administration of stuff, roads, infrastructure, and so on. 'Superb', while ambitious, is a good term for government's aspiration.
What better way of making the case for Scottish independence can there be than by showing how it's done? No stunts, no wheezes, no excuses, just do it well.
Have you checked the UK zeitgeist lately for the normal expectations of the British public? If you haven’t, normal is expecting things to be a bit shit. At the risk of encouraging a pomposity from PB’s chief anecdotalist, what would be your recent examples of governments running things very well?
Which is why I find it genuinely depressing that, since devolution, we’ve had so little to show for it in the things that actually matter: health outcomes, education outcomes, housing, infrastructure delivery, addiction and mental health, local services that work, and the general sense that the state can still build and run things competently. Plenty of blame to go around across administrations, but after almost 19 years in power the SNP own the results.
There is a debate to be had about why the first Labour devolved administration was not as successful as hoped on that front, but the problem with the SNP is they are determined to prove that devolution can't be successful, which makes it hard for them to run a successful devolved administration...
The SNP are a protest party, a single issue nationalist campaigning group who have found themselves in power for the last 19 years with no idea what to do with it.
Come on then, give me your Unionist manifesto to make a success of devolution then.
The problem for Unionist parties in Scotland with devolution is that it has entirely infantilised them (and as sub branches being junior was always part of their nature). They constantly piss and moan about the EssEnnPee without providing any kind of an alternative prospectus except ‘well, we wouldn’t do that’. In addition having their head offices running non-devolved government for Scotland in perpetuity keeps them as barely developed embryos floating in the warm, amniotic fluid of the Union.
Sorry, went a bit Leon with the metaphors there.
did you read my post down-thread?
I did, a dearth of solid policy proposals but a lot of ‘just do things better’.
I recall one PBer (resident in England) saying that it was the SNP’s job to govern ‘superbly’ to make the case for an Indy Scotland. Since I can’t think of any recent national governments let alone devolved ones as a model for that level of attainment, it seems a bit unfair to single out the SNP for so much unrealistic expectation.
I don't think it's unfair in the slightest to lay the blame for the state of the nation I live in at the feet of those that have been in power for the best part of 20 years. I'm not in politics, so I don't have to provide you with anything like a solid policy proposal or unionist manifesto. I can point out everything and anything that the SNP does is wrong.
I reject your framing of politics in Scotland through the divisive and self-serving nationalist lens. I reject your tribal loyalty to any party over state and good governance.
but still, if you feel better about it you can just lump me in with the rest of the right wing unionist scum and ignore me.
Jeezo, talk about framing.
‘They’re doing it all wrong but I can’t say what they should do to make it right, and I’ve mentioned Unionist scum which means though that person never used that phrase they’re a vile Cybernat!’
Righty ho, I’ll lump you in with all the other rightwing Unionist MASSIVE snowflakes and ignore you henceforth.
from my post earlier:
"I’m not asking for miracles. I’m asking for grown-up government: competent delivery, honest trade-offs, and outcomes you can measure. If you’re going to wrap yourself in Scottish pride and talk about our resource abundance, then show me the national project that turns that into shared prosperity. Otherwise it’s just branding. And I’m completely out of patience for branding."
Now we could spend a while debating reasonably about how to do this, how to measure outcomes, honest dialog about tradeoffs and what that means for what passes for debate and scrutiny in Holyrood. But you're not interested in that if it means taking any criticism of the SNP or any recognition that the politics of nationalism have poisoned the well.
Which is why I find it genuinely depressing that, since devolution, we’ve had so little to show for it in the things that actually matter: health outcomes, education outcomes, housing, infrastructure delivery, addiction and mental health, local services that work, and the general sense that the state can still build and run things competently. Plenty of blame to go around across administrations, but after almost 19 years in power the SNP own the results.
There is a debate to be had about why the first Labour devolved administration was not as successful as hoped on that front, but the problem with the SNP is they are determined to prove that devolution can't be successful, which makes it hard for them to run a successful devolved administration...
The SNP are a protest party, a single issue nationalist campaigning group who have found themselves in power for the last 19 years with no idea what to do with it.
Come on then, give me your Unionist manifesto to make a success of devolution then.
The problem for Unionist parties in Scotland with devolution is that it has entirely infantilised them (and as sub branches being junior was always part of their nature). They constantly piss and moan about the EssEnnPee without providing any kind of an alternative prospectus except ‘well, we wouldn’t do that’. In addition having their head offices running non-devolved government for Scotland in perpetuity keeps them as barely developed embryos floating in the warm, amniotic fluid of the Union.
Sorry, went a bit Leon with the metaphors there.
did you read my post down-thread?
I did, a dearth of solid policy proposals but a lot of ‘just do things better’.
I recall one PBer (resident in England) saying that it was the SNP’s job to govern ‘superbly’ to make the case for an Indy Scotland. Since I can’t think of any recent national governments let alone devolved ones as a model for that level of attainment, it seems a bit unfair to single out the SNP for so much unrealistic expectation.
That's an extraordinary lack of ambition. The normal expectation for any democratic government, whether devolved or not, is that they run everything they are charged with running very well.
The stuff people want run well is the ordinary non party political stuff of government - health, education, civil administration of stuff, roads, infrastructure, and so on. 'Superb', while ambitious, is a good term for government's aspiration.
What better way of making the case for Scottish independence can there be than by showing how it's done? No stunts, no wheezes, no excuses, just do it well.
Have you checked the UK zeitgeist lately for the normal expectations of the British public? If you haven’t, normal is expecting things to be a bit shit. At the risk of encouraging a pomposity from PB’s chief anecdotalist, what would be your recent examples of governments running things very well?
Eat out to help out was executed flawlessly by Sunak.
If energy prices soar then the underlying issue will be around a quarter of households literally won't be able to pay their energy bills. Once enough people stop paying that will snowball into a payment strike and the energy firms themselves won't be able to purchase enough energy to keep supply going.
I am generally very much against the "something needs to be done" line of thinking but energy prices at 2022 levels is rightly in that category. There are lots of different approaches but all come with political risks and costs. Those who think it can be left to a "free" market here are deluded.
It will be summer soon. I have already had one day when the central heating didn't come on. The idea you might be able to economise seems to escape some people. Eat salads and cold food. Decommission the big freezer. Turn lights off. If the heating is still on, turn it off when you go out. Turn it off at night, that's what bedclothes are for. Reduce driving - go shopping on foot, replace leisure activities with those close to home, tell the teenagers to walk home. As rcs1000 says, prices are sending us a message.
All this is true, but it doesnt change the chain of events that will happen if prices went to 2022 levels (as others have pointed out, nowhere near them presently) without govt support:
Significant proportion of households can't pay. Others will stop paying. Suppliers hit cash flow problems and can't afford to buy energy. Government forced to step in anyway.
The logical thing to do would be to give money to those who are struggling rather than artificially reduce energy prices. That would stop people from freezing but still provide an incentive to reduce energy use.
Define struggling, please?
I'd do it just as Eabhal suggests. Temporarily raise UC and Pension Credit.
Edit: Or it might be better politically to call it some sort of fuel allowance, but there'd be no requirement to spend it on fuel.
Which is why I find it genuinely depressing that, since devolution, we’ve had so little to show for it in the things that actually matter: health outcomes, education outcomes, housing, infrastructure delivery, addiction and mental health, local services that work, and the general sense that the state can still build and run things competently. Plenty of blame to go around across administrations, but after almost 19 years in power the SNP own the results.
There is a debate to be had about why the first Labour devolved administration was not as successful as hoped on that front, but the problem with the SNP is they are determined to prove that devolution can't be successful, which makes it hard for them to run a successful devolved administration...
The SNP are a protest party, a single issue nationalist campaigning group who have found themselves in power for the last 19 years with no idea what to do with it.
Come on then, give me your Unionist manifesto to make a success of devolution then.
The problem for Unionist parties in Scotland with devolution is that it has entirely infantilised them (and as sub branches being junior was always part of their nature). They constantly piss and moan about the EssEnnPee without providing any kind of an alternative prospectus except ‘well, we wouldn’t do that’. In addition having their head offices running non-devolved government for Scotland in perpetuity keeps them as barely developed embryos floating in the warm, amniotic fluid of the Union.
Sorry, went a bit Leon with the metaphors there.
did you read my post down-thread?
I did, a dearth of solid policy proposals but a lot of ‘just do things better’.
I recall one PBer (resident in England) saying that it was the SNP’s job to govern ‘superbly’ to make the case for an Indy Scotland. Since I can’t think of any recent national governments let alone devolved ones as a model for that level of attainment, it seems a bit unfair to single out the SNP for so much unrealistic expectation.
That's an extraordinary lack of ambition. The normal expectation for any democratic government, whether devolved or not, is that they run everything they are charged with running very well.
The stuff people want run well is the ordinary non party political stuff of government - health, education, civil administration of stuff, roads, infrastructure, and so on. 'Superb', while ambitious, is a good term for government's aspiration.
What better way of making the case for Scottish independence can there be than by showing how it's done? No stunts, no wheezes, no excuses, just do it well.
Have you checked the UK zeitgeist lately for the normal expectations of the British public? If you haven’t, normal is expecting things to be a bit shit. At the risk of encouraging a pomposity from PB’s chief anecdotalist, what would be your recent examples of governments running things very well?
Eat out to help out was executed flawlessly by Sunak.
The vaccine roll out - including the impossible* training of pharmacists to give injections.
*impossible in the sense of not done in the U.K. Many other countries do vaccines etc at the pharmacy.
You can't subsidise your way out of a supply shock.
World energy supply has fallen. World energy demand needs to drop to match supply.
That's what the price is: it's information that tells you that you need to reduce demand. If you (and everyone else) tries to subsidise their way out of the supply shock, then all you do is make the remaining producers of that energy rich, without solving the problem.
Now: there are ways you can ... ameliorate ... a short term supply issue caused by the closure of the Straits of Hormuz. Your country might, if it had any sense, have six months of natural gas demand in storage that could be run down at times like this.
But the better, longer-term, plan is simply to have more energy produced in ways that simply aren't susceptible to the a reduction of natural gas an oil supply. (For what it's worth, coal doesnt help much. Why? Because energy for power generation is pretty fungible. If natural gas gets more expensive, then coal fired power stations get used more. Prices are set at the margin, so the price of coal will rise until -on a per megawatt hour basis- it comes into line with natural gas. Hence why Newcastle Coal prices are now a staggering $130+/ton.)
And because of the way our electricity market works, the live UK price per MWh is £100 despite gas only accounting for 3.5gw of generation out of 38 on this windy, sunny day.
Is there a way to see if wind/solar is being curtailed ?
Because this energy mix & price looks ludicrous to me:
OIl prices off their overnight highs with Saudi apparently putting 2 million barrels (a drop) into supply via the Red Sea.
WTI is currently at $95 with Brent around $100 per barrel. These are the kind of numbers which, if sustained, will push us (and a lot of other countries) into recession. Even strong performing economies will feel this kind of oil price "shock" if it continues for any length of time.
There still seems plenty of confusion over Hormuz and oil production in the Gulf States and a degree of clarity would be welcome. The Iranians, if the morning coverage is to be believed, are still capable of strikes but on a limited scale.
Last night's local council by-elections were again poor for both Labour and the Conservatives with both losing share - to be fair, the seven votes won by Labour in the Cotswolds were fractionally worse than the eight won by the Conservatives in Liverpool but both parties took a pounding in all the seats.
Something for Reform, Greens and the LDs in last night's results and you could predict where the changes would be based on areas of known strength and weakness.
I'm beginning to wonder how well the Greens will do in parts of Inner London in May - it will be fascinating to see the numbers of candidates they can put up in places like Lewisham. Last time, Labour won 55% and all 54 seats, the Greens got 20% and stood 44 candidates. I suspect a full slate of Green candidates this time and if they can get the big swings some of the local by-elections are suggesting, it could be a real shock for Labour.
I think there will be lots of surprised Green paper candidates who get elected!
There were a lot of 'surprised' Lib councillors in the mid sixties. Many of them didn't last, either as Libs or councillors.
I spoke to a paper LibDem candidate this morning and warned him to be careful! There's a lot of Labour seats that are going to fall and someone's got to win them.
This will be the most boring article ever published in the history of the Internet but I've come up with a snappy title to leaven the doughy misery of reading the fucking thing - "The Transgina Monologues".
The latest version of the article, including the links, appendices, sources and the discussant contributions, is just over 20,000 words long. That is one looooong monologue.
If energy prices soar then the underlying issue will be around a quarter of households literally won't be able to pay their energy bills. Once enough people stop paying that will snowball into a payment strike and the energy firms themselves won't be able to purchase enough energy to keep supply going.
I am generally very much against the "something needs to be done" line of thinking but energy prices at 2022 levels is rightly in that category. There are lots of different approaches but all come with political risks and costs. Those who think it can be left to a "free" market here are deluded.
It will be summer soon. I have already had one day when the central heating didn't come on. The idea you might be able to economise seems to escape some people. Eat salads and cold food. Decommission the big freezer. Turn lights off. If the heating is still on, turn it off when you go out. Turn it off at night, that's what bedclothes are for. Reduce driving - go shopping on foot, replace leisure activities with those close to home, tell the teenagers to walk home. As rcs1000 says, prices are sending us a message.
All this is true, but it doesnt change the chain of events that will happen if prices went to 2022 levels (as others have pointed out, nowhere near them presently) without govt support:
Significant proportion of households can't pay. Others will stop paying. Suppliers hit cash flow problems and can't afford to buy energy. Government forced to step in anyway.
The logical thing to do would be to give money to those who are struggling rather than artificially reduce energy prices. That would stop people from freezing but still provide an incentive to reduce energy use.
Define struggling, please?
I'd do it just as Eabhal suggests. Temporarily raise UC and Pension Credit.
Edit: Or it might be better politically to call it some sort of fuel allowance, but there'd be no requirement to spend it on fuel.
Link benefits to short term inflation, then?
Call it Short Term Inflation Indexing?
You could link the standard allowance to an index that represents the typical basket of goods consumed by UC/PC claimants (excluding housing, because that is covered seperately). I remember some pop star making the point food was going up way faster than luxury shoes etc etc.
It would also have to be adjusted rapidly because the allowance significantly lags CPI at the moment.
Apologies if this has been mentioned, but administration officials admitted the US hadn't planned for the closing of the Straits in a closed briefing according to multiple sources. Quite breathtaking.
If energy prices soar then the underlying issue will be around a quarter of households literally won't be able to pay their energy bills. Once enough people stop paying that will snowball into a payment strike and the energy firms themselves won't be able to purchase enough energy to keep supply going.
I am generally very much against the "something needs to be done" line of thinking but energy prices at 2022 levels is rightly in that category. There are lots of different approaches but all come with political risks and costs. Those who think it can be left to a "free" market here are deluded.
Subsiding energy prices is a really inefficient way to do it though, for two reasons:
1) Energy consumption correlates closely with income. The richest households burn much more gas and petrol/diesel than poorer ones. The exception is electricity, as a percentage of household income, though that will change with EVs rolling out. It's a fiscal transfer from poor, working households in small flats to rich, non-working households in large detached houses.
2) The incentives are all wrong. By protecting consumers from these hikes we are sending a signal that they don't need to switch away from fossil fuels, or make their homes more efficient. Over the long term it actually increases our exposure to these crises.
So, I'd suggest a temporary uplift to the standard allowance of UC and to Pension Credit, if anything.
‘Temporary’.
The WFA was temporary. The ‘windfall tax’ was temporary
Comments
(Conducted under the Interplanetary Local Governance Act, 2087)
Electorate: 3,842 registered residents
Turnout: 2,119 (55.1%)
Rejected ballots: 17
(14 marked “None of these, bring back the rovers”, 3 eaten by a small maintenance drone)
Syria Planum North Ward – Martian Municipal Elections
Electorate: 3,842
Turnout: 2,119 (55.1%)
Rejected ballots: 17
Majority: 211 over Reg “Dusty” Halvorsen
Swing: +7.4% toward the Progressive Terraforming Party since the 2083 by-election.
The problem for Unionist parties in Scotland with devolution is that it has entirely infantilised them (and as sub branches being junior was always part of their nature). They constantly piss and moan about the EssEnnPee without providing any kind of an alternative prospectus except ‘well, we wouldn’t do that’. In addition having their head offices running non-devolved government for Scotland in perpetuity keeps them as barely developed embryos floating in the warm, amniotic fluid of the Union.
Sorry, went a bit Leon with the metaphors there.
https://bsky.app/profile/electionmaps.uk
Presumably his X feed is the same but X now presents posts in a random order for me so I don't look at it any more.
Firstly, America just doesn't have enough soldiers. The liberation of Iraq in 2003 needed 200,000, so America might need half a million for this. The American frontline army is only 452,000, on active duty and it would need at least twice as many for its other simultaneous tasks, R&R, etc. so it would have to introduce conscription. And training the new, unwilling recruits would take a year.
Secondly, how do you get the troops there? A ground invasion of a country of 92 million people - four times the population of Iraq in 2003 - with still-loyal armed forces would need hundreds of thousands of troops. America doesn't have the landing craft for an amphibious assault on that scale, which would be 5-10x the size of D-Day. Manufacturing them would take a decade as America's shipbuilding capacity has atrophied since the end of the Cold War.
So it would have to be a ground invasion. Where from? None of Iran's neighbours are remotely likely to host US, let alone Israeli, ground troops on the scale necessary for the year or so it would take to get ready, all the while being exposed to Iranian attacks. Israel would be delighted to host American troops for an invasion of Iran, but it's too far away.
Thirdly, invading a country of 92 million is one thing. Occupying it is something else entirely. As I've mentioned on here before, a rule of thumb is that you need one soldier for every 20 people to hold down an unwilling country. That's 4.6 million to occupy Iran for who knows how long? Again, where are they to come from?
Fourthly, America is still a flawed democracy, albeit a flawed one, Wars need political support, especially if conscription will be necessary, and there's not much for an air campaign. For a ground invasion and occupation there would be none whatsoever.
So America isn't too afraid - it's sensible.
Good morning @algarkirk, @noneoftheabove, @Nigelb, @Barnesian, @MattW, @Sweeney74, @LostPassword
In my upcoming trans article (with discussant contributions from kyf_100 and Cyclefree, currently being pre-read by Taz and Andy_JS), one of the appendices contains the discussion from PB we had about the difference between "should" and "must". In that discussion we see the following text...
- viewcode Posts: 27,814 12:21PM https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5454915/#Comment_5454915
- algarkirk Posts: 16,626 12:30PM https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5454925/#Comment_5454925
- noneoftheabove Posts: 26,664 12:37PM https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5454933/#Comment_5454933
- Nigelb Posts: 86,328 12:54PM https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5454948/#Comment_5454948
- algarkirk Posts: 16,626 1:06PM https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5454963/#Comment_5454963
- Barnesian Posts: 9,739 2:01PM edited 2:02PM https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5455019/#Comment_5455019
- algarkirk Posts: 16,626 2:11PM https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5455033/#Comment_5455033
- MattW Posts: 32,077 2:13PM edited 2:18PM https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5455035/#Comment_5455035
- Sweeney74 Posts: 90 2:15PM https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5455039/#Comment_5455039
- LostPassword Posts: 22,429 2:15PM https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5455040/#Comment_5455040
If you want your identities to be partially obscured (like this)...- [REDACTED] 12:30PM https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5454925/#Comment_5454925
...or totally obscured (like this)...- [REDACTED] [REDACTED]
...just let me know before 9pm today pleaseSo, on things like the Chagos islands and perhaps with the treasury, he'd work with civil service orthodoxy and that is the way it has panned out.
But with things like criminal justice, immigration, housing and infrastructure, I imagined he'd have an idea of the types of institutional buttons to press to get things unblocked. Now, I'm not saying that my hopes have been wholly dashed on this score, and I wasn't necessarily expecting super zippy progress, but there have been more false starts and a bit less progress than I'd have thought back in 2024.
Changing the systemic policy is what politics is really for. And in the list "criminal justice, immigration, housing and infrastructure@ no one thinks that the systemic policy is 100% AOK.
Good morning @NigelB, @Barnesian, @Phil, @kinabalu, @Cyclefree, @kyf_100
In my upcoming trans article (with discussant contributions from kyf_100 and Cyclefree, currently being pre-read by Taz and Andy_JS), another of the appendices (appendix 6) contains a list of comments prior to the article being written. In that discussion we see the following text...
@viewcode
https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5337029/#Comment_5337029
https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5337049/#Comment_5337049
https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5337052/#Comment_5337052
https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5337053/#Comment_5337053
https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5337054/#Comment_5337054
@NigelB
https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5337057/#Comment_5337057
@Barnesian
https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5336716/#Comment_5336716
https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5336711/#Comment_5336711
https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5336732/#Comment_5336732
@Phil
https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5336721/#Comment_5336721
@Kinabalu
https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5336695#Comment_5336695
@Cyclefree vs @Viewcode
https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5381803#Comment_5381803
@Cyclefree
See also https://www1.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2025/11/17/the-scottish-playbook/
@kyf_100
https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5379281/#Comment_5379281
https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5379283/#Comment_5379283
https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5379284/#Comment_5379284
If you want your identities to be partially obscured (like this)...
[REDACTED]
https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/5379281/#Comment_5379281
...or totally obscured (like this)...
[REDACTED]
[REDACTED]
...just let me know before 9pm today please.
And again, many thanks for putting in a huge amount of effort on parsing the law around this. I suspect you might get little in the way of thanks, and plenty of argument.
https://x.com/RealAirPower1/status/2032236672780288172
This is not.
"The olive branch has been removed from the newly designed 2026 U.S. dime, which features an eagle clutching only arrows, along with the inscription "Liberty over Tyranny". This is a temporary, one-year change for the 250th anniversary of the U.S. and not a permanent, quiet removal; the standard Roosevelt dime design is scheduled to return in 2027
https://x.com/_BMSimpson/status/2032405753319796912
https://morrisf1.blogspot.com/2026/03/australia-2026-pre-qualifying_13.html
@JasonGroves1
Labour Together urges ministers to impose a 'temporary' 2p hike in income tax to fund another energy bill bailout
https://x.com/JasonGroves1/status/2032413254115373333
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/clyg4wx6nxgo
To me, this is terrifying. Kids are complex and knowing how to deal with things they say can be hard enough as a parent. The scope for harm is horrifying. And the fact that there are apparently parents dumb enough to buy/permit this shit even more so.
Thinking of how these models work, what on earth is it going to come out with for a child who thinks they're different, possibly autistic, questioning gender etc?
A friend, when we were over, had her and our kids using copilot as part of a game where they were hiding from her parnter. It suggested using sticks as weapons and various booby traps, home alone style
ETA: she did supervise them in their interactions and stopped after this!
I recall one PBer (resident in England) saying that it was the SNP’s job to govern ‘superbly’ to make the case for an Indy Scotland. Since I can’t think of any recent national governments let alone devolved ones as a model for that level of attainment, it seems a bit unfair to single out the SNP for so much unrealistic expectation.
https://x.com/Osinttechnical/status/2032366797001765274
What we have with some people is an effortless shift in their narrative from "X will never be done" to "It is right that X has been done".
Examples being Hunter Biden's pardon or Dem gerrymandering.
What Trump causes in some people is a Manichean mentality.
Some people will declare that "Trump was right about everything" and even wear a hat to show their obsession, while others will shift into some "Trump was wrong about everything" mania which leads them to disagreeing with everything Trump has said or done and also claiming that his opponents were always doing the right thing.
So while Trump is a monstrous malignant narcissist who is corrupt, crude, abusive, erratic and totally unfit for office he has been correct about some issues.
Such issues including:
Europe needs to spend more on defence
Energy security is important
The benefits of economic growth have not been fairly shared in recent decades
Uncontrolled immigration is leading to socioeconomic problems
And it is because Trump has highlighted such issues that he was elected twice.
Where it is justifiable to criticise Trump is his actions in response to those issues. These actions generally being badly planned and badly applied.
Likewise Trump being unfit for office doesn't change the fact that Joe Biden was also unfit for office.
The 'our side right, your side wrong' mentality of US politics has led to almost the entire political body of both parties proclaiming that a man who was unfit for office was fit for office. The only difference being that one half said that Biden was fit for office and the other half said that Trump was fit for office. When neither were.
That is the disgrace of the US political system and I do like to see it echoed on PB.
I'm not in politics, so I don't have to provide you with anything like a solid policy proposal or unionist manifesto.
I can point out everything and anything that the SNP does is wrong.
I reject your framing of politics in Scotland through the divisive and self-serving nationalist lens.
I reject your tribal loyalty to any party over state and good governance.
but still, if you feel better about it you can just lump me in with the rest of the right wing unionist scum and ignore me.
Our electricity and heating prices are too high, but we’re heading into spring and we need market reform not giveaways. And pump prices are now some of the cheapest in Western Europe. Petrol is over €2 per litre in France now.
He and the rest of the government seems to have thought that embracing the various Departmental Policies would fix everything. Then was sunrises to discover he was getting Continuity Sunak
I am generally very much against the "something needs to be done" line of thinking but energy prices at 2022 levels is rightly in that category. There are lots of different approaches but all come with political risks and costs. Those who think it can be left to a "free" market here are deluded.
- Lib Dems consolidating in their heartlands and barely touched by surges in Reform support
- Greens surging in the left wing urban areas (and in an inner suburb last night) at Lib Dem and Labour expense, but losing ground in rural areas
- Reform replacing Tories on an almost like for like basis
Just kidding!
World energy supply has fallen. World energy demand needs to drop to match supply.
That's what the price is: it's information that tells you that you need to reduce demand. If you (and everyone else) tries to subsidise their way out of the supply shock, then all you do is make the remaining producers of that energy rich, without solving the problem.
Now: there are ways you can ... ameliorate ... a short term supply issue caused by the closure of the Straits of Hormuz. Your country might, if it had any sense, have six months of natural gas demand in storage that could be run down at times like this.
But the better, longer-term, plan is simply to have more energy produced in ways that simply aren't susceptible to the a reduction of natural gas an oil supply. (For what it's worth, coal doesnt help much. Why? Because energy for power generation is pretty fungible. If natural gas gets more expensive, then coal fired power stations get used more. Prices are set at the margin, so the price of coal will rise until -on a per megawatt hour basis- it comes into line with natural gas. Hence why Newcastle Coal prices are now a staggering $130+/ton.)
https://tradingeconomics.com/commodity/uk-natural-gas
If we get close to Russia-Ukraine war levels of domestic energy cost, and that continues into next Winter, then maybe things change.
‘They’re doing it all wrong but I can’t say what they should do to make it right, and I’ve mentioned Unionist scum which means though that person never used that phrase they’re a vile Cybernat!’
Righty ho, I’ll lump you in with all the other rightwing Unionist MASSIVE snowflakes and ignore you henceforth.
My Reform supporting mates don’t ostracise me for voting Labour or vice versa.
We disagree, vehemently over Braverman, but we have so much that unites us.
The idea that criticism of government policies is only allowed if you present alternatives is classic.
Stephen Bush
@stephenkb.bsky.social
· 4m
This bizarre gulf between the self-conception of Starmer-Reeves as Tough Guys Who Make Hard Decisions and the practice of “what if we had a pick and mix of the easy and wrong rhetoric from the right *and* the easy and wrong rhetoric from the left?”
https://bsky.app/profile/stephenkb.bsky.social/post/3mgwuaepeo22j
On the points you raise.
Europe needs to spend more on defence. Largely true, however Trump's adjacency to Putin have made this more urgent.
Energy security is important. However new renewable technologies which would see the decline of fossil fuels have been jettisoned, not lest because Trump is in the debt of Exxon- Mobil and Texaxo.
The benefits of economic growth have not been fairly shared in recent decades. Absolutely true, but Trump's response has been to cut taxes for the wealthiest, particularly the super rich.
Uncontrolled immigration is leading to socioeconomic problems. This is indeed true both over here and in the US. Immigration has however been weaponised in the US to the degree of White Supremacy. Hence the current (some would say) lawless action of DHS ( and ICE).
Even when Trump has a point, his remedy is invariably cruel.
Is this Tim Beddows collection or someone else’s ? We know Tim Beddows had two missing DW and the estate was held up by his business partner. As he had debts assets would be sold to clear them. He also had missing Public Eye.
Or is it someone else’s and that is still to come ?
Who made me the person that allows criticism? People can say any old shit on here they like as is proved daily, and others can treat it with the contempt it deserves, them’s the only rules.
Mandelson will probably make a bid for the Viceroy of Mars, by then
Day 4 - 7 races and it’s all over 😭
13:20 - Selma De Vary
14:00 - Ndaawi
14:40 - Panic Attack
15:20 - Doctor Steinberg
16:00 - JANGO BAIE
16:40 - Stattler
17:20 - Nurse Susan
Significant proportion of households can't pay.
Others will stop paying.
Suppliers hit cash flow problems and can't afford to buy energy.
Government forced to step in anyway.
The average score is Reform 27.5%, Conservative 18.0%, Labour 17.7%, Green 15.5%, Lib Dem 12.1%.
The stuff people want run well is the ordinary non party political stuff of government - health, education, civil administration of stuff, roads, infrastructure, and so on. 'Superb', while ambitious, is a good term for government's aspiration.
What better way of making the case for Scottish independence can there be than by showing how it's done? No stunts, no wheezes, no excuses, just do it well.
1) Energy consumption correlates closely with income. The richest households burn much more gas and petrol/diesel than poorer ones. The exception is electricity, as a percentage of household income, though that will change with EVs rolling out. It's a fiscal transfer from poor, working households in small flats to rich, non-working households in large detached houses.
2) The incentives are all wrong. By protecting consumers from these hikes we are sending a signal that they don't need to switch away from fossil fuels, or make their homes more efficient. Over the long term it actually increases our exposure to these crises.
So, I'd suggest a temporary uplift to the standard allowance of UC and to Pension Credit, if anything.
Edit: Or it might be better politically to call it some sort of fuel allowance, but there'd be no requirement to spend it on fuel.
Truss vs Rishi campaigned strongly against energy subsidies with all the same arguments that make a lot of theoretical sense but practically don't resolve the issue. Once in power she realised she had no option and actually went further than Rishi was suggesting.
* It is not just their problem, because the process for cutting them off is slow, not going to cope with the numbers and politically damaging. It is not just the suppliers problem either as they legally can't just supply people who pay, and without being paid they can't keep buying the energy for those who do pay.
Crazy footage from yesterday in the Nineveh Governorate of Northern Iraq, close to the Kurdish-majority city of Erbil, showing an American Low-Cost Uncrewed Combat Attack System (LUCAS), a copycat of the Iranian Shahed-136, striking a building utilized by Iraq’s Iranian-backed Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF).
Whenever something goes wrong, it's always up to someone to make it right, preferably with money.
That the money has to come from somewhere is filed in the *too difficult" tray.
He may have been reduced to black goo in the basement of Morgoths spare winter chalet, but he’s not gone.
At the risk of encouraging a pomposity from PB’s chief anecdotalist, what would be your recent examples of governments running things very well?
"I’m not asking for miracles. I’m asking for grown-up government: competent delivery, honest trade-offs, and outcomes you can measure. If you’re going to wrap yourself in Scottish pride and talk about our resource abundance, then show me the national project that turns that into shared prosperity. Otherwise it’s just branding. And I’m completely out of patience for branding."
Now we could spend a while debating reasonably about how to do this, how to measure outcomes, honest dialog about tradeoffs and what that means for what passes for debate and scrutiny in Holyrood. But you're not interested in that if it means taking any criticism of the SNP or any recognition that the politics of nationalism have poisoned the well.
Call it Short Term Inflation Indexing?
We guarantee the security of any oil tanker, under any flag, that can convince an American destroyer to escort it through the Strait of Hormuz.
Kwality shitbaggery from the IRGC.
*impossible in the sense of not done in the U.K. Many other countries do vaccines etc at the pharmacy.
Because this energy mix & price looks ludicrous to me:
It would also have to be adjusted rapidly because the allowance significantly lags CPI at the moment.
Quite breathtaking.
The WFA was temporary. The ‘windfall tax’ was temporary
It will be temporary in name only.